THE ALIMENTARY CANAL AS A SOURCE OF CONTAGION 19 



By 8 a.m. on the 28th, the animal was noticed to be ill. It stood 

 alone in the pen, pawed with its fore foot, and had, at times, an excited 

 look. By 12 o'clock noon of the same day it was much worse. It lay 

 down on its side and uttered a moaning sound as if delirious ; its 

 breathing was heavy. From time to time it arose, again to assume the 

 recumbent posture within a minute or two. When lying down, the head 

 was thrown straight out spasmodically and a little back. 



By 4 p.m., or just about forty-four hours after receiving the injection, 

 the animal died. 



The autopsy was performed immediately afterwards. There was a 

 complete absence of ticks. Both hind legs were intensely swollen from 

 the presence of cedematous liquid, and, curiously, the uninoculated limb 

 seemed to be more cedematous than that which had been the subject of 

 experiment. The oedema also extended over the whole of the front of 

 the abdomen. The liquid was serous in character, blood-stained, and 

 was permeated with a bacillus identical with that introduced, slightly 

 motile, and apparently not sporing. 



The peritoneal sac was almost dry. The few drops of liquid removed 

 were clear, and contained a good many lymph corpuscles, and a few 

 bacilli. 



The organs seemed to be unaltered. 



A pipette was filled with the clear peritoneal liquid from the original 

 lamb, sealed off, and incubated at 37° C. After twenty-four hours at 

 this temperature, the contents of the tube had become thick and muddy. 

 This result was due to a splendid sporing rod having developed within it, 

 alike with that obtained from other animals dying of Louping-ill. The 

 spore was oval-shaped, was placed usually at one end of the rod, and was 

 of a faintly yellowish-brown colour. Many spores were also seen lying 

 free. Certain of the rods did not contain a spore, and these were usually 

 dividing. 



About 2 c.c. of the incubated peritoneal liquid were mixed with about 

 10 c.c. of sterile distilled water, and 5 c.c. of the mixture were injected 

 subcutaneously into the left thigh of a Cheviot hogg, side by side with 

 5 c.c. of a I to 10 solution of glacial acetic acid in water. 



The experiment was made on May 26th, 1903, at 5 p.m., and by the 

 following morning at 8 a.m. the animal was found to be very ill. It was 

 lying down in the pen with the legs drawn under the body, and with a 



(19) C I 



