166 Manual of Veterinary Microbiology. 



when it accidentally penetrates into the living tissues 

 and finds there good conditions of vitalit}^ it only 

 multiplies locally and not iu the blood, the oxygen 

 of which destroys these microbes as soon as they en- 

 ter this medium; on the contrary, some time after 

 death it is found in the circulatory fluids. 



Large wounds, exposed to free contact with the 

 air, are not easily contaminated on account of the 

 anaerobic character of this bacillus. On the other 

 hand, the latter readily implants itself in irregular 

 contused wounds where the affected tissues are in 

 way of necrosis. The following experiment of MM. 

 Chauveau and Arloing is decisive in this regard. If. 

 after the injection of a few drops of the virus into 

 the jugular of a ram, the circulation is arrested in 

 one testicle by histournage, this testicle becomes the 

 starting point of a fatal gangrenous process. 



When a wound becomes contaminated with the 

 septic bacillus, if the local conditions are not adverse 

 to its multiplication, an inflammatory process is seen 

 to supervene the characters of which are those of the" 

 experimental oedema noted above. Absorption of 

 the products elaborated by the bacilli, in other words, 

 the septic intoxication, leads to general manifesta- 

 tions of the disease which, sooner or later, terminates 

 fatally. In fact, when 30 to 40 cub. cent, of the se- 

 rosity of the cedema, deprived of its bacteria by fil- 

 tration, are injected into the guinea pig, it leads to 

 death in a few hours with symptoms of septicaemia. 



Transmission of the disease from one subject to 

 another most frequently occurs by means of surgical 

 instruments which have been contaminated by con- 

 tact with an infected wound; this is the cause of the 



