98 Mr. E. H. Hankin. [May 22, 



From this table it is obvious that a decrease took place in the 

 number of living bacilli present in the samples that were successively 

 taken from the globulin solution. That is to say, the bacilli were 

 gradually killed until in some experiments (as shown by the plate 

 cultures remaining sterile) no survivors were left. In these cases 

 the gelatine was, after a few days, inoculated with anthrax, when it 

 always produced a copious growth, showing that the result was in no 

 way due to any imperfection in the gelatine employed. That the 

 destruction was not due to sodium sulphate or other salts present is 

 shown by Experiment VII, for here the liquid is seen to lose its 

 bacteria-killing power by being simply boiled, a treatment capable of 

 destroying the globulin but not the salts. In other cases the globulin 

 solution was boiled after the plate cultures had been inoculated from 

 it. Then it was re-inoculated with anthrax with or without addition 

 of a small quantity of bouillon, and always produced atypical growth. 

 In Experiment VII, after two days, the test tabes containing the 

 solutions B and C were found to contain anthrax growths, the one in 

 C being somewhat scanty. Solution A, however, had remained 

 sterile, all the bacilli in it having been killed. Then, without pre- 

 vious boiling or any other treatment, it was inoculated with anthrax 

 spores, and in twenty-four hours had produced a copious growth. 

 This proves conclusively that the destruction of bacilli that had taken 

 place was due to a similar cause to that which is operative in the 

 analogous experiments with blood serum. For Lubarsch* has pointed 

 out that, although the serum is capable of killing the bacilli added to 

 it, the spores (of anthrax) not only are unharmed by it, but imme- 

 diately begin to develop, producing a crop of bacilli, which seem to 

 have acquired tolerance against the bacteria-killing power of the 

 medium. It is interesting to notice that, as shown in Experiment VIF, 

 the cell globulin obtained from the spleen was more energetic in 

 killing bacteria than that derived from lymphatic glands. In this 

 experiment the spleen and the lymphatic glands were taken from the 

 same dog, left under alcohol for the same time (twenty-four hours), 

 and otherwise subjected to exactly similar treatment. In Experi- 

 ment V the globulin was derived from the lymphatic glands and 

 spleen of a cat, which were chopped up and extracted together. 

 Here the bacteria-killing action was more energetic than in the pre- 

 vious experiments. I generally noticed that the bacteria-killing 

 power is less, the longer the globulin is kept under alcohol, which 

 agrees with Halliburton's assertion,! that by very prolonged action of 

 alcohol the cell globulin is rendered permanently insoluble, as is the 

 case with other proteids. 



* Loc. cit. 



t " On the Nature of the Fibrin Ferment," ' Proceedings of Physiological Society,* 

 1888 (in 'Journal of Physiology,' vol. 9). 



