REPORT OF THE BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY, 95 



Pig No. 359, died March .24. 



! 



pleural exudate spleen cults. 



b. i. cult. swine plague bacteria 



I chromogeue 



rabbit (subcutis), March 25 rabbit (subcutis), March 25 

 died March 2H died March 26 



(swine plague) (swine plague) 



. cult, (liver) b. i. cult, blood 



b.i. cult. April 2 



2 rabbits (ear), April 4 

 died April 7,8 

 (swine plague) 



No. 360 was exposed February 18 with pig No. 359, just described. After one 

 month of exposure it became very weak and emaciated and kept on failing until it 

 was found dead April 6. Its abdomen was very much distended : this distension 

 haa appeared before death. Superficial inguinal glands somewhat enlarged and 

 congested. Peritonitis indicated by some reddish serum and by strings of fibrin 

 stretched across coils of large intestine. The latter were greatly distended with gas 

 and semi-liquid feces. Glands of meso-colon hemorrhagic. Lungs collapsed, quite 

 red. Exostoses as large as marbles on four right lower ribs near cartilages. No 

 other lesions observable. This animal, therefore, had not contracted the disease as 

 observed in those animals with which it had been penned. 



Another animal (No. 378) which had been growing poor for nearly a month and 

 finally died was also affected with extensive hepatization of the lungs. The lesions 

 observed were briefly as follows : 



Scaly patches on the side of neck , on buttocks. About 25 cubic centimeters of yellow 

 serum in abdomen, a few strings of coagulated lymph on coils of intestines. Liver 

 dark, resistant. Gall bladder distended with dark-brownish bile. Stomach empty, 

 bile-stained. Mucosa of intestinal tract dark, probably due to venous stasis ; no ul- 

 ceration. Heart large, flabby. Right heart filled with a very dark soft clot. Left 

 auricle distended by a very firm white thrombus, left ventricle partly filled by a 

 dark clot. All vessels leading to and from heart filled with molds of' dark coagu- 

 lated blood. Lungs partly collapsed. Slight fibrous adhesion of each lung to chest 

 wall. The cephalic and ventral lobes of each lung and the azygos lobe airless, solid, 

 of a grayish-red, semi-translucent, or waxy appearance ; bronchi plugged with a 

 glairy mucus. At least one-half of the left principal lobe and one-third of the right 

 hepatized, being the ventral portions. The disease was moving from the ventral to 

 the dorsal side, i. e., from below up when the animal is standing, the only portions 

 not affected being those nearest the back-bone. 



Although forms resembling swine plague bacteria were found on microscopic ex- 

 amination in the solidified portions, a rabbit inoculated on the ear did not succumb. 



The microscopic examination of sections made from that portion of the lungs 

 most recently affected and stained according to Gram gave some interesting results. 

 Capillaries very much distended, with red corpuscles, so that alveolar walls appear 

 very thick. Alveoli and smallest air tubes plugged with dense masses of cells, 

 epitheleoid and round. In the alveoli are found chains of cocci (streptococcus) from 

 five to twenty in a chain, winding in and out through the cell mass. They are ap- 

 proximately 1 micromillimeter long, slightly oval, and stain very deeply. In some 

 groups of alveoli these streptococci are very numerous, in others they are few in 

 number, or else replaced by another form consisting of minute bacilli in groups of 

 few to many, usually within the protoplasm of the cells contained in the alveoli. 

 These bacilli resemble tubercle bacilli very closely. In some alveoli they are ex- 

 ceedingly numerous. These two forms of bacteria, stained dark blue and strongly 

 contrasting with the brown color of the cells (bisniarck brown), were perhaps the 

 only ones present, none others in sufficient numbers to be detected. 



Cultures from, blood of heart, spleen, and liver remained sterile. 



