AMCEB.E OF THE INTESTINAL TRACT. 177 



the contents of the abscesses containing amoebae. In 

 order to control his experiments he believed it was 

 necessary to cultivate the bacteria found in the feces 

 of dysenteric patients and to inject these separately 

 and together. Regarding these experiments he says : 



" Cultures were made from the feces of the same 

 individuals whose discharges had been used to suc- 

 cessively produce dysentery, and these were then in- 

 jected into the intestines of four puppies. There was 

 absolutely no effect produced. It, therefore, seems 

 unreasonable to conclude that the germ that produces 

 the disease is a bacterium; or, at any rate, it seems 

 fairly certain that it cannot be an organism that 

 develops, or even lives, in the culture media ordinarily 

 employed. As neither of these suppositions appears 

 at all probable, and as the amoeba was the only other 

 living organism found in the feces, that was probably 

 absent from the cultures, it seems logical to suppose 

 that this parasite is the cause of any morbid state 

 that the injection of these discharges may give rise 

 to. This view is supported by the fact that the amoebae 

 are abundantly present in and around the ulcers that 

 are found in the intestines of the dogs suffering from 

 experimental dysentery, and it does not appear un- 

 reasonable to say that the proof is now fairly clear 

 that these organisms are in reality the causative 

 agents in chronic dysentery." 



12 



