THE DIGESTIVE ORGANS 215 



In 1874 tne pasture was dressed with 8 hundredweight crushed 

 rock-salt to the acre, and again in 1880 it got another dressing, hit 

 no cases of red-water or anthrax have been seen since the salt was first 

 applied. I have also seen a number of cases of anthrax, the cause 

 of which was set down to eating mouldy cotton cake, particularly 

 undecorticated, which should never be stocked during the months of 

 June to September, for it is very apt to mould, and is then highly 

 dangerous, and it is just possible that the anthrax spores (seeds) may 

 have been lying latent in the mouldy cake, and brought into activity 

 on consumption by the cow. 



325. As already stated, this disease is due to the Bacilli anthracis 

 (minute rod-like bodies) ; yet these little organisms are not found in 

 the blood until an hour or so before death, although they may be 

 present in the spleen and other internal organs. The bacilli, or rods, 

 as seen in a fresh unstained drop of blood under the microscope, are 

 noticed to vary in length, being estimated to be from tt 1 qo to 2 -^q^ 

 of an inch long and ^ - J w to 3^31^ °f an mcn broad, but with rounded 

 ends, and having all the appearance of minute splinters of glass 

 mixed amongst the blood corpuscles. When stained with methylene 

 blue the rods are readily seen like small portions of black thread 

 amongst the corpuscles. The anthrax bacilli, being aerobic, require 

 for their development and growth a large quantity of oxygen, and in 

 the living body they multiply by transverse division or fission — 

 breaking into two — increasing with great rapidity, and thus robbing 

 the blood of its oxygen, which becomes watery and dark coloured? 

 and the bacilli crowd into the minute bloodvessels — the capillaries 

 — block them up, and the animal dies suddenly, as if suffocated for 

 the want of oxygen. When experimenting outside the body, and the 

 bacilli are placed in a suitable nutrient material and at a proper 

 temperature, they develop very quickly and form a sort of chain-like 

 filament, and, when supplied with oxygen, generate spores or seeds 

 for the next generation ; and as an illustration, a pea-pod full of peas 

 may be taken, the pod being likened to the bacilli, while the peas 

 resemble the spores or seeds. As the spore formation also requires 

 a large quantity of oxygen, it rarely takes place inside of the body \ 



