OF CHOLERA AND COMMAS. 313 
bacilli, identical in every respect with those found in choleraic 
dejecta. Notwithstanding their presence in this water, and 
notwithstanding the extensive use the 200 families were con- 
stantly making of it, there has been no outbreak of cholera. 
Now, we have in this instance an experiment performed by 
nature on a scale large enough to serve as an absolute and 
exact one. This water had been contaminated with choleraic 
evacuations, and of course with the comma-bacilli, and it was 
used extensively by many human beings for several weeks. If, 
to speak with Koch, the comma-bacilli were the cause and 
essence of cholera, how is it that not one person among so 
many has, until the middle of December, contracted the dis- 
ease? Clearly because the water did not contain the cholera 
virus, and because this latter has nothing to do with the 
comma-bacilli”’ (p. 36). 
Other instances are cited of the occurrence of comma-bacilli 
in tanks wholly unassociated with any recent outbreak of 
cholera, and, taken altogether, the evidence adduced is strik- 
ingly opposed to the correctness of the interpretation which 
Koch had proposed as to the connection of the disease with 
water of this character, unless, as a result of seasonal and other 
influences, the comma-shaped organisms found by Dr. Klein in 
November were different from those found by Dr. Koch in 
February. As it is not explicitly stated that Drs. Klein and 
Gibbes subjected the “commas ” from these tanks to the test 
of cultivation, it could not be accepted as established that they 
were identical with those of cholera ; but, on the contrary, they 
may have been identical with those discovered by Dr. Koch in 
some water near the Salt-water Lakes (a few miles out of Cal- 
cutta), which he found by cultivation to be physiologically dif- 
ferent from the comma-shaped organism of cholera. The 
secretary, however, has ascertained from Dr. Klein that, 
although it is not distinctly stated in the report that these 
tank-commas were cultivated, nevertheless, as a matter of fact, 
they had been, and were found to be identical with Dr. Koch’s 
choleraic commas, so that this phase of the question may be 
looked upon as disposed of. 
