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244 ANNALS OF THE Міѕѕоові BOTANICAL GARDEN 
the subject of animal pathology the relative importance of 
fungi as producers of diseased conditions in the higher ani- 
mals. The arrangement of this material will be in taxonomic 
sequence with respect to the fungi. In the second place, this 
paper will consider the distribution in nature of the known 
pathogenic fungi, and also will give the results of the au- 
thor’s experiments to determine whether there are any or- 
ganisms among the very large number of saprophytic wild 
yeasts that might prove pathogenie when introduced into 
the bodies of animals. 
Quite recently Loeb, Moore, and Fleisher (713) obtained 
a culture of a yeast-like organism from an infected sarcoma 
which had developed in the tissues of a man sixty-two years 
of age. After the operation was performed the tumor was 
removed to the laboratory, and was sterilized by searing the 
surface with a heated spatula. Small pieces of the tissue, 
removed from the interior with sterilized instruments, were 
placed in tubes of sterilized sugar solution; and after about 
twenty-four hours the culture liquid became turbid, due to 
the presence of a yeast-like fungus. Inoculation experiments 
on animals demonstrated that the organism was very patho- 
genic. This fungus was studied in the laboratory at the Mis- 
souri Botanical Garden by Professor George T. Moore. Its 
accidental occurrence in cancer and the pathogenic action on 
animals suggested the investigation undertaken in this paper. 
Many of the so-called pathogenic fungi were carefully 
studied before their importance as disease-producing organ- 
isms was recognized. Other parasitic fungi were discovered 
only after the characteristic disease had been known for cen- 
turies, and it remained for modern methods of investigation 
to determine the true nature of the disease. А brief his- 
torieal survey, consequently, will develop important and in- 
teresting faets bearing upon the relations of scientifie re- 
seareh to the advancement of the study of microbiology. 
The pathogenic réle of the fungi has been much discussed. 
The first authors considered them as saprophytes which were 
developed in special circumstances, more often in a preéx- 
isting lesion. Others, on the contrary, admit that these 
