BACILLUS COLI COMMUNIS. 453 



ated with dysentery, probably as a secondary affection, 

 as in amoebic or tropical dysentery. It is also found 

 frequently in cases of diffuse and circumscribed peri- 

 tonitis, appendicitis, etc., either alone or together with 

 other bacteria which play a part in the etiology of these 

 diseases along with certain chemical ferments and toxins 

 and foreign bodies in the intestines. The origin of in- 

 fections of the gall-ducts (with at times the production 

 of gallstones) and multiple abscess of the liver is also 

 explained in this way by Dmochowski and Jauowski, 

 though, according to Letienne, the mere presence of 

 the B. coli in the bile, in which it has been found 

 under normal conditions, is not sufficient to account 

 for these affections. Puerperal fever is not infre- 

 quently caused by the colon bacillus by infection of 

 the vagina or uterus. Other diseases to which the 

 colon bacillus seems to stand in a certain relation, 

 though rarely, are : Endocarditis, meningitis, tropical 

 abscess of the liver, bronchopneumoriia and an irregu- 

 lar type of lobar pneumonia, fetid bronchitis, chronic 

 amygdalitis, and abscess of the lachrymal sac. The B. 

 coli has been found in a case of urethritis (pseudo- 

 gonorrhoea) lying inside the cells like gonococci, and it 

 is often associated with the pyogenic cocci in cutaneous 

 and subcutaneous purulent inflammations. 



In the above-mentioned diseases the colon bacillus 

 has been found either alone or associated with other 

 pathogenic bacteria in such numbers as to be con- 

 sidered a factor in the etiology of the disease, and in 

 some cases there is no reason to doubt that it is the 

 primary cause of infection. Though further study and 

 investigation are required to show the specific patho- 

 genic properties of this micro-organism, it is evident 



