FUNGI AND BACTERIA. 25 



samples have been found which, though they contained 

 these moulds, were harmless. Such differential action 

 might possibly be accounted for by assuming the pre- 

 sence of different strains of the same species. An analog- 

 ous case has been described by Dr. M. Otto, who found 

 that while a strain of Aspergillus fumigatus from Italy 

 was markedly poisonous, another from Germany was not 

 at all, or only slightly so. The existence of similar strains 

 of other common moulds has not, however, been demon- 

 strated. 



A more promising line of attack has been from the 

 bacteriological standpoint. The work was carried out at 

 the Kentucky Agricultural Experimental Station by Gra- 

 ham, Bruechner and Pontius. They isolated from mouldy 

 hay that had caused typical cases of forage poisoning, a 

 bacillus resembling B. botulimt.s,the organism of botulism. 

 Like the latter it is an anaerobic bacillus but grows in air 

 when accompanied by certain of the moulds usually found 

 on forage. Pure cultures of the bacillus, fed to horses, 

 mules and guinea pigs, produced typical cases of forage 

 poisoning, similar to those caused by the hay from which 

 it had been obtained. The disease is apparently caused 

 by toxins produced for the most part, before the forage 

 is eaten. In their experiments animals were poisoned 

 from a single barrel of the hay, by water which had been 

 poured over the forage and had dissolved some of the 

 toxin. Since the bacillus in question closely resembled 

 B. botulimis in appearance, anaerobic characters, and 

 physiological effects, these investigators made further 

 tests to determine, if possible, whether the two were 

 identical. Antitoxic serum prepared from B. botulinus 

 was procured and was found to produce immunity from 

 the effects of the bacillus cultured from the poisonous 



