426 



PLAGUE 



Hong Kong in 1894. The results of their investigations, which 

 were published almost at the same time, agree in most of the 

 important points. They cultivated the same organism from a 

 large number of cases of plague, and reproduced the disease in 

 susceptible animals by inoculation of pure cultures. It is to 

 be noted that during an epidemic of plague, sometimes even 

 preceding it, a high mortality has been observed amongst certain 



FIG. 143. Film preparation from a plague bubo showing enormous numbers 



of bacilli, most of which show well-marked bipolar staining. 



Stained with weak gentian- violet, x 1000. 



animals, especially rats and mice, and that from the bodies of 

 these animals found dead in the plague-stricken district, the 

 same bacillus was obtained by Kitasato and also by Yersin. 



Bacillus of Plague Microscopical Characters. As seen in 

 the affected glands or buboes in this disease, the bacilli are 

 small oval rods, somewhat shorter than the typhoid bacillus, 

 and about the same thickness (Fig. 143), though considerable 

 variations in size occur. They have rounded ends, and in 

 stained preparations a portion in the middle of the bacillus is 



