26 THE AMERICAN MONTHLY [Jan 
of fresh grass into our mouths. We cannot help inhaling 
the dust of a threshing-machine and are most likely ex- 
posed to the inroads of this pestilent organism in a thous- 
and ways which it is impossible to guard against. Once 
settled in the mucous membrane of the mouth, oesopha- 
gus, alimentary tract, or respiratory passages, it begins 
to grow and creates inflammation. Sometimes an ulcer 
is produced, sometimes a sort of tumor, and it is usually 
the latter condition that the surgeon is called upon to treat 
or the pathologist to examine. The tumor is of a pale 
yellowish color, globular in shape, riddled with holes of 
a larger or smaller size containing pus, and very vascular, 
although it presents a superficial resemblance to the in- 
terior of a tuberculous or gummatous deposit. It infil- 
trates all the tissues with which it comes in contact, 
spreading in the intermuscular planes and to some ex- 
tent into the muscles, extending far and wide into the 
calcareous structure of bones, occupying extensive por- 
tions of the solid viscera and forming communications 
between the hollow viscera. 
It sometimes attacks the skin, sometimes it is met with 
in the lymphatic glands and occasionally it is distribu- 
ted to distant parts of the body by the vascular system, 
exactly as in embolic pyemia ; itis then found in the brain 
or joints, or indeed any part of the body. 
The younger forms are wedge or “candle-flame” shaped; 
others are rod-shaped,and in old cultures, club-shaped and 
rounded formsare common. Experimental inoculations 
in calves,and guinea-pigs were negative. In rabbits, in- 
tra-peritoneal inoculations were also negative in result, 
but ulceration is produced by inoculation of the cornea, 
and in the epithelial cells of this, round or oval bodies 
are found. These are identical with the bodies described 
by Guinieri and Pfeiffer in the cornea] tissue inoculated 
with vaccine lymph, and in the corneal vesicles in variola, 
and which were considered by them to be probably pro- 
