MICROPHYTES FOUND IN 1 HE BLOOD. 389 



attached or free, varies considerably iu preparations from different 

 animals, and even in preparations from the same aniaial, so that 

 staves may be seen to range from 3 to 6 ju in length and occa- 

 sionally even to exceed these limits. The average width of the 

 staves was 1 ju, but deviations from the average were equally evi- 

 dent in these measurements also. Sometimes it was found that 

 the specimens present in one organ are smaller or larger than 

 they are in another belonging to the same animal. 



If a very minute quantity of blood of this character be placed 

 on a slide with a little aqueous humour, it will be found that 

 in the course of four or five hours, if the temperature be about 

 90°, the bacilU will have grown very considerably, the majority 

 measuring 20 to 60 /u, and here and there in the preparation a 

 filament may be observed stretching half across the field of the 

 microscope. A few hours later still, a meshwork of well-formed 

 filaments will be manifest (PI. XVII, fig. 2) . Some of these fila- 

 ments will be found to be distinctly segmented, others apparently 

 without a single segment in their entire length, though even in 

 these a tendency will be observed to form more or less acute 

 angles at certain distances. Other specimens will be found to 

 show traces of segmentation at either end or towards the middle. 

 Drying the specimen, or treating it with reagents, will make the 

 segments much more distinct. 



A few hours later some of the filaments will be seen to con- 

 tain brightly refringent, long-oval molecules, varying slightly 

 in size, but r2 ^ in length by 1 ^u in width, may be given as fair 

 average dimensions. These are the 'spores^ which have been 

 described in Bacillus anthracis, &c. In a short time these re- 

 fringent bodies dot the entire length of the filaments, a tendency 

 being manifested to present groups of twos along the line. Gra- 

 dually the filaments become more and more indistinct, until, 

 finally, only the more or less distinctly linear arrangement of 

 these refringent bodies remains to indicate the path of the fila- 

 ment (PI. XVII, fig. 3). 



I have spent many hours, days even, in watching isolated 

 molecules of this kind, but have never been able to see anything 

 which would warrant my saying positively that they germinated : 

 I can only support what Nageli, de Bary, and others have per- 

 sistently affirmed, namely, that the schizomycetes multiply by 

 fission only. The bodies described and figured as germinating 

 by Colin, Koch, and others (figs. 5, 6) may be seen in most pre- 

 parations, some of which will be found figured by myself in PL 

 XVII, fig. 5, but, so far as my experience goes, none of the 

 objects delineated represent the germination of ' spores ' or 

 conidia ; certainly, here and there, bodies may be seen which at 

 first sight appear very like it — such, for example, as the refrin- 



VOL. XIX. NEW SER. C C 



