354 APPLICATION OF METHODS OF BACTERIOLOGY 



selected the pulverized egg-albumen of Merck for this 

 purpose. The culture-medium is prepared as follows: A 

 2 per cent, solution of the egg-albumen is made in water, 

 to which is added 20 c.c. of a tenth-normal caustic soda 

 solution per 100 c.c. of fluid, and this is allowed to stand 

 for one-half hour, being agitated from time to time. It is 

 then filtered and placed in Erlenmeyer flasks in amounts 

 of 30 to 50 c.c., and sterilized by the intermittent method. 

 The medium, when thus prepared, is colorless, transparent, 

 of a light-yellow color, and reacts distinctly alkaline to 

 litmus-paper. To this medium nutrient agar-agar or the 

 ordinary bouillon may be added in the proportion of one 

 part of the egg-albumen medium to two or three parts of 

 the agar medium or the bouillon, and this he calls the 

 " egg-albumen-agar" or the "egg-albumen-bouillon medium, 

 on which micrococcus gonorrhoea grows very satisfactorily. 

 The special advantages claimed for this medium are that 

 it can be prepared at any time and without difficulty, is 

 quite clear and transparent, and permits, where agar-agar 

 is used, the employment of the medium for the study of 

 colony formations. 



If micrococcus gonorrhoese be transplanted from the origi- 

 nal culture to either glycerin-agar-agar or to Loffler's serum- 

 mixture, a growth is sometimes observed, more often in the 

 latter than in the former, but of so feeble a nature that these 

 substances cannot be regarded as suitable for its cultivation 

 and certainly not for its direct isolation from the body. As 

 a rule, development does not occur on glycerin-agar. 



Microscopic examination of colonies of this organism 

 reveals the presence of a diplococcus somewhat larger than 

 the ordinary pyogenic cocci. The opposed surfaces of the 



