SPIRILL UM METSCHNIKO VI. 595 



rather diminished in size, and the organs generally are 

 normal in appearance. In the watery fluid large num- 

 bers of spirilla are found; they are found in the blood 

 of pigeons always, but only in the blood of young fowls. 

 A few drops of a pure culture inoculated subcutane- 

 ously in pigeons cause their death in eight to twelve 

 hours. According to Gamale'ia, fowls may be infected 

 by giving them food contaminated with the cultures of 

 the spirillum, but pigeons resist infection in this way. 

 Infection may also be produced by way of the mouth 

 by Koch's method, a solution of carbonate of soda and 

 laudanum having been previously administered. The 

 animals then die with symptoms of acute gastro- 

 enteritis; the intestines are found to be highly inflamed 

 and their liquid contents contain numerous spirilla. 

 In contradistinction to the pathogenic virulence of 

 these spirilla for pigeons and guinea-pigs, the cholera 

 spirillum is much less pathogenic. Pigeons are not 

 killed by the intramuscular inoculation of pure fresh 

 cultures of the vibrio cholerse. Gamale'ia has claimed 

 that by passing the cholera spirillum of Koch through 

 a series of pigeons, by successive inoculation, its path- 

 ogenic power is greatly increased, and that when steril- 

 ized cultures of this virulent variety of the comma 

 bacillus are injected into pigeons they become immune 

 against the pathogenic action of the vibrio Metschni- 

 kovi, and the reverse. But Pfeiffer has shown that 

 this statement is not founded upon fact. The patho- 

 genic action of the vibrio Metschnikovi upon pigeons 

 and guinea-pigs, producing in these animals general 

 septicsemia and death, is, therefore, a characteristic point 

 of difference between this and the spirillum of Asiatic 

 cholera. 



