BACTERIA AND DISEASE 305 



Two or three days after inoculation a red pimple appears, 

 which rapidly passes through a vesicular stage until it is a 

 pustule. Concomitantly we have glandular enlargement, 

 general malaise, and a high temperature. Thus from a local 

 sore a general infection may result. Unless this does occur, 

 the issue will not be fatal, and the bacilli will never gain 

 entrance into the blood or be anything but local. 



3. Respiratory Tract. In man this is the commonest form 

 of all, and is well known under the term " wool-sorters' dis- 

 ease, ' ' or pulmonary anthrax. This mode of infection occurs 

 when dried spores are inhaled in processes of skin-cleaning. 

 It frequently commences as a local lesion affecting the 

 mucous membrane of the trachea or bronchi, but it rapidly 

 spreads, affecting the neighbouring glands, which become 

 greatly enlarged, and extending to the pleura and lung 

 itself. Such cases, as a rule, rapidly end fatally. 



From what has been said, it will be clear that anthrax 

 carcasses are better not opened and exposed to free oxygen. 

 An extended post-mortem examination is not necessary. 

 Burning the entire carcass in a crematorium would be the 

 ideal treatment. As such is not generally feasible the next 

 best thing is to bury the carcass deeply with lime below and 

 above it, and rail in the area to prevent other animals graz- 

 ing off it. 



A very small prick will extract enough blood to examine 

 for the anthrax bacilli which are driven by the force of the 

 blood-current to the small surface capillaries. This occurs, 

 of course, only when the disease has become quite general, 

 for in the early stage the healthy blood limits the bacilli 

 to the internal organs. In such cases examination of the 

 blood of the spleen is necessary. 



Anthrax covers a wide geographical area all over the 

 world, and no country seems altogether exempt. In Ger- 

 many as many as 3700 animals have been lost in a single year. 

 About 900 animals were attacked in 1897 in Great Britain. 



