560 BACTERIOLOGY. 



malaria. Occurring as it does at the same season of 

 the year viz., from June to October and being con- 

 nected apparently, like malaria, in some way with the 

 condition of the soil, there is a certain analogy between 

 these two diseases. Anthrax is found to occur mostly 

 in low, swampy localities, where the soil is covered with 

 decaying vegetable matter, and subject to overflows and 

 freshets. There is no doubt that this bacillus is able to 

 lead a saprophytic existence for some time, under favor- 

 able conditions, in the superficial layers of the soil, re- 

 maining latent in the form of spores and retaining its 

 vitality; but why an epidemic of anthrax occurs one 

 year at a certain place and at the same place the next 

 year does not, it is not easy to explain. Pasteur believes 

 that the earth-worm plays an important part in bringing 

 to the surface and distributing the spores which have 

 been propagated in the buried carcass of an infected ani- 

 mal; but Koch has shown that this hypothesis is both 

 improbable and superfluous. Apart from the fact that 

 spor ulation does not normally take place inside the bodies 

 of dead animals, the earth-worm is ill adapted for the 

 transportation of anthrax spores, which are unfavorably 

 affected in their intestines. Out of seventy-two earth- 

 worms examined by Ballinger from a notoriously infected 

 locality, only one contained anthrax spores. Further- 

 more, the soil in places where such carcasses lie buried 

 is already saturated with the fluids and other products 

 of decomposition of the body of the dead animal contain- 

 ing bacilli, which under suitable temperature conditions 

 may form spores and thus infect the surface of the land; 

 though it is possible that the earth-worm, in some in- 

 stances, may contribute to the distribution of spores to 

 a certain extent. It would, therefore, seem that the only 



