the Medical Officer of the Local Government Board (" Oyster 

 Culture in its Eelation to Disease," 1894-1895, pp. 114 and 

 115), and it was discovered by the older method : phenolated 

 broth and phenolated gelatine, so that in this instance it 

 must have been present in very considerable numbers. In 

 the other instances (2, 3, and 4) above mentioned the identi- 

 fication was somewhat easier, viz., by the Drigalski-Conradi 

 medium, of which presently more will be said. In the last 

 instance, viz., oysters from Langstone Harbour, the typhoid 

 bacilli were met with in one oyster to the amount of several 

 dozen per oyster. When I speak of the B. typhosus having 

 been identified, I mean the microbe had responded to all and 

 every test of which there are many, as will presently be 

 described which denote the known characters of the- 

 microbe of typhoid or enteric fever. 



From the foregoing it will appear interesting to inquire 

 whether and to what extent under the circumstances of 

 actual specific fouling of shellfish, such as must occasionally 

 occur in estuaries^ and on the shores of the coast, where 

 oysterlayings and oysterponds, mussels and cockles, are 

 exposed to almost continuous sewage pollution, the obnoxious 

 and dangerous microbes which have found entrance into the 

 shellfish are readily, and by what methods, removable from 

 such shellfish; or whether having once gained entrance 

 remain in it and make as it were therein a home for them- 

 selves. It is clear that if the latter should be the case no 

 remedy would be available to render such shellfish 

 principally oysters fit for consumption ; whereas, if the 

 former should be the case a remedy would be available. 

 With reference to oysters this question is of greater import- 

 ance, inasmuch as the great majority of these shellfish are 

 consumed in raw state, whereas in the case of mussels and 

 cockles leaving out the instances in which the enthusiastic 

 gatherers eat them raw some kind of heating process, 

 though as we shall see this is not always effective and reliable, 

 is employed previous to their being eaten, and therefore the 

 majority of dangerous microbes presumably are in many 

 cases devitalised. 



