134 THE BACTERIA IN ASIATIC CHOLERA. [CH. 



stomach pass too rapidly through the small intestine, and 

 since the comma-bacilli could only unfold their poisonous 

 action, i.e. could produce the chemical poison, if they had 

 time to remain there and to multiply. Consequently if they 

 were not delayed on their passage through the small intestine 

 they would not multiply there, and once in the caecum where 

 the reaction is acid, they would become harmless. To this 

 method of reasoning I must take exception. Koch shows 

 by direct experiment that even twenty hours after injection 

 the comma-bacilli can be recovered from the small intestine 

 in a living state. Now the most important character of all 

 pathogenic bacteria is this, that when introduced into the par- 

 ticular tissues suitable for their propagation they set up their 

 pathogenic power. How is it then, one might reasonably 

 ask, that the comma-bacilli, if even only for a few hours in 

 the small intestine, do not invade in swarms the epithelium 

 and superficial layers of the mucous membrane ? Koch does 

 not, and of course cannot, deny that all absorption of the chyle 

 must take place in the small intestine, and since the comma, 

 bacilli are much smaller than the large chyle globules, and 

 are possessed of spontaneous mobility, it follows of necessity 

 that the comma-bacilli can and must readily pass into the 

 epithelium and the superficial layers of the mucous mem- 

 brane ; and since the epithelium and the superficial mucous 

 membrane, according to Koch's own statement and belief, are 

 the suitable nidus for the multiplication and action of the 

 comma-bacilli, all conditions would therefore here exist 

 which are required for their settling down and acting. Add to 

 this that 10 ccm. of a broth culture of comma-bacilli containing 

 millions and millions of comma-bacilli, are subject to absorp- 

 tion by the small intestine for twenty hours (see the above- 

 mentioned observations of Koch), and that such vast crowds 

 of comma-bacilli in a few hours kept at the body-temperature 



