332 TEXT-BOOK OF BACTERIOLOGY. 



inflammation of the urethra. The healthy urethra also contained 

 micro-organisms in no way distinguishable from the so-called gono- 

 cocci, so that their exclusive occurrence was doubtful and could, at 

 any rate, not be utilized to settle their etiological significance. 



But all these objections must be disclaimed as unjustified. Any 

 individual property of the gonococci, their roll-like form, their 

 position within the cells, their decoloration by Gram's method, or 

 their failure on our ordinary media, is, of course, unable by itself to 

 characterize the bacteria with certainty. But considering all the 

 criteria together, we have sufficient means of distinguishing the 

 gonococci from other bacteria. The result of observations hitherto 

 made, pointed to the probability that the bacteria found by Neisser 

 are the original exciters of gonorrhoea. 



This supposition has become a certainty by positive experiments 

 of transmission made by Bockhart and Bumm. The difficulties of 

 artificially cultivating the gonococci and keeping them capable of 

 living outside of the body has been stated. Gonorrhoea being, be- 

 sides, a disease exclusively afflicting man and promising successful 

 transmission only in transplanting its presumed exciters to man, 

 it will be easy to understand why the number of such experiments 

 has, as yet, been so small. Some of them, however, undertaken by 

 Bumm, are apt to remove the last doubt of the specific nature of 

 the gonococci. The twentieth generation of a culture on human 

 blood- serum inoculated on the sound urethra of an incurable par- 

 alytic person produced a typical gonorrhoea. 



It is unnecessary to discuss in detail the absorption of the in- 

 fectious matter the transmission of the cocci. Be it remarked 

 that only certain mucous membranes are accessible to the settle- 

 ment of these bacteria. Gonorrhoea, in man, has its seat in the 

 urethra; so it has in woman, but in her it is also located in the 

 cervix uteri and Bartholin's glands, while the vagina, at least in 

 adults, remains regularly free, and is more frequently attacked only 

 in childhood, during which infectious vagimtis is a widely-diffused 

 disease. The conjunctiva must finally be mentioned as a privileged 

 point of attack on the part of the gonococci, which settle there 

 chiefly in the most superficial layers of the mucous membrane, 

 whence they pass into the secreted pus. 



XXVII. TETANUS BACILLUS (KITASATO). 



We conclude this part by discussing the causative micro-organ- 

 ism of a particular disease of wound-infection, distinguished by 

 very remarkable symptoms, viz., the bacillus of traumatic tetanus. 

 The real character of this strange affection has long been in 



