374 Syphilis 



out that the bacilli of both tuberculosis and leprosy stain 

 by his method, and thus gave Baumgarten the right to 

 suggest that the few cases well adapted for the demon- 

 stration of the Lustgarten bacilli in the internal organs 

 might be cases of mixed infection of tuberculosis and 

 syphilis. The organism is no ' longer considered to be 

 specific for syphilis, and has fallen into oblivion. 



BACILLUS OF VAN NIKSSEN.* 



General Characteristics. A motile, flagellated, sporogenous, 

 aerobic and optionally anaerobic, non-chromogenic bacillus cultivated 

 from the blood of syphilitics, cultivable upon all the usual media, and 

 capable of being seined by all methods, including that of Gram, but 

 not resisting the de :olorant effects of acids. 



Van Niessen has cultivated a bacillus from the serum of 

 syphilitics that he looks upon as specific. The researches 

 of others, however, have, up to the present time, entirely 

 failed to confirm van Niessen's results. 



SPIROCH^TA PALLIDA (SCHAUDINN). 



For a long time it has been known that in preputial 

 smegma and in various ulcerative lesions of the generative 

 organs, certain spiral organisms could be demonstrated. 

 Bordet studied these with some care, expecting to prove that 

 they were concerned with the etiology of syphilis. It 

 remained, however, for Schaudinn and Hoffmannf to point 

 out that there were two spiral organisms, one which he calls 

 Spirochaeta refringens, which is found in almost all ulcerative 

 lesions of the genitalia, and another which he calls Spiro- 

 chaeta pallida, which is found only in primary and secondary 

 syphilitic lesions. The latter organism is difficult to stain 

 and the best results were obtained by Giemsa's or Marino's 

 Azur Eosin.t The observations of Schaudinn and Hoff- 

 mann have been fully confirmed by Metschnikoff and it 

 seems probable that Spirochaeta pallida is of some etiologic 

 importance in syphilis. 



*"Centralbl. f. Bakt. u. Parasitenk.," Bd. xxm, No. 2, Jan. 19, 

 1898, p. 49; Nos. 3 and 4, Jan 31, 1898, p. 97; and Nos. 5 and 6, Feb. 

 11, 1898, p. 177. 



f" Deutsche med. Wochenschrift," May 4, 1905. 



I "Ann. de 1'Inst.," 1904, p. 764. 



"Bull. Acad. de med. de Paris," May 16, 1905. 



