388 



NA TURE 



[February 22, 1900 



•enormously extended through the munificent liberality 

 of Lord Iveagh, who, in placing at the disposal of the 

 Council a sum of no less than a quarter of a million 

 ■sterling, has shown an example of keen insight into the 

 ■needs of scientific investigation in this country that 

 must, ere long, have most important results in raising 

 the standard of experimental research in the field of 

 medicine. 



From a perusal of the Second Series of the Trans- 

 actions^ published some short time ago, it is evident that 

 the increased facilities offered for the carrying on of 

 investigations in the laboratories have already borne 

 abundant fruit, the papers in the present volume being 

 not only more numerous but also relatively of consider- 

 ably greater importance than those that appeared in the 

 ■first volume. 



The introduction contains a fairly full descriptive 

 account of the laboratories in the various departments 

 in the beautiful building on the Chelsea Embankment, 

 an account which will be of considerable interest to 

 those who would know what has been the development 

 of laboratory accommodation and apparatus during the 

 last few years. 



The first paper, from the pen of Prof. Ehrlich, 

 " Observations upon the constitution of the diphtheria 

 itoxin," has great value, especially just at the present, 

 as he describes his " toxin spectrum," a careful study 

 of which promises to throw light on the constitu- 

 tion of these most complicated bodies. Dr. William 

 Bulloch also makes a contribution to the study of 

 diphtheria toxins A new pathogenic streptothrix is 

 described by Dr. George Dean. This organism pro- 

 duces in the horse a disease which might be described 

 •clinically as actinomycosis, from which however it differs 

 very considerably in certain important points. He con- 

 siders that it is much more nearly allied to the bacilli of 

 the diphtheria and tubercle groups than to the moulds, 

 and that actinomycosis is a disease due not to one 

 specific micro-organism, but to a number of allied 

 species. Dr. R. T. Hewlett contributes two papers ; 

 one, " Preliminary observations on the occurrence of 

 the bacillus enteritidis sporogenes (Klein) in ulcerative 

 colitis and in the normal dejecta " ; the other " On 

 Neisser's diagnostic stain for the diphtheria bacillus." 

 In an article on "the bacteriology of the normal con- 

 junctival sac from a report of 200 cases, and its practical 

 bearing on the utility of antiseptics in ophthalmic sur- 

 gery," Mr. Arnold Lawson urges the abolition of anti- 

 septics in ophthalmic surgery on the ground that the 

 strongest antiseptic is the healthy conjunctiva itself. 

 He maintains that in order to eliminate suppuration as 

 far as possible from the list of accidents that may occur 

 after operations, only two factors have to be attended to : 

 (i) perfect asepsis on the part of the operator, his in- 

 struments, dressings, &c., and (2) the healthy condition 

 of the conjunctival sac. Mr. J. E. Barnard contributes 

 an interesting and ingenious article on photogenic 

 bacteria. He concludes that the different species of 

 phosphorescent bacteria described are probably identical 

 or merely closely allied varieties. They are all markedly 

 pleomorphic, readily undergo involution, and only phos- 

 iphoresce in the presence of oxygen. The phosphorescent 

 NO. 1582, VOL. 61] 



principle may be kept back by a Berkefeld filter, and 

 anything that affects the vitality of the organism affects 

 likewise the production of light. Dr. Alfred Salter 

 writes "on the pathogenicity of the pseudo-diphtheria 

 bacillus, and its relation to the Klebs-Loufifler organism." 

 He finds that the pseudo-diphtheria bacillus has the 

 power of producing a non-toxic but antitoxin-fixing 

 substance, and he argues that this is an additional 

 fact in favour of the pseudo-diphtheria bacillus and the 

 Klebs-Loefifler bacillus being practically identical. Dr. 

 Arthur Harden, in Part i. of a paper dealing with "the 

 fermentation of sugars by bacillus coli communis and 

 allied organisms," gives a short history of the subject 

 and a number of his own e.xperiments, from which he 

 draws the following conclusions : (i) the organisms that 

 he used, when grown anaerobically in a medium con- 

 sisting of beef broth alone or in conjunction with peptone, 

 produce inactive lactic acid from the glucose, but may, 

 when a very vigorous growth occurs, produce a small 

 amount of the active Ijevo-rotatory acid. The lactic 

 acid prqduced amounts to about 50 per cent, of the weight 

 of sugar decomposed ; (2) in media containing peptone 

 but no beef broth, a mixture of the inactive acid with 

 the kevo-lactic acid is formed ; (3) the gas produced by 

 the decomposition of the glucose consists of i to i '3 vols, 

 of hydrogen to i vol. of carbonic acid gas. Mr. Sydney 

 Rowland, writing on the structure of bacteria, puts for- 

 ward the thesis that in the actively living bacterial cell no 

 reticular structure can be demonstrated, such reticulum 

 only being present except when the cell is progressing 

 either to spore-formation or to granule-formation. In the 

 actively living cells, which consist of cell wall, cell 

 plasma and granules, the cell wall is a progressive 

 formation and becomes finally a rigid structure. The 

 fine refractile granules staining vividly with roseine may 

 participate in cell-division or may be extruded from the 

 cell through the cell wall. These granules are present 

 even in an embryo on emergence from the spore-case. 

 Drs. Allan Macfadyen and Frank R. Blaxall continue 

 their article on thermophilic bacteria, which are specially 

 important as regards the fermentation in ensilage and 

 the digestion of cellulose. 



Mr. G. Harris Morris gives a short account of the 

 technical applications of bacteriology. One of the 

 shortest but most important papers in the whole collec- 

 tion is a record of an experiment carried on with the 

 object of determining the etiology and pathology of 

 cancer. All those interested in this subject will anxiously 

 await further and corroborative evidence of the very 

 striking result obtained by Dr. H. Lambert Lack. Dr. 

 Allan Macfadyen records the important symbiotic fer- 

 mentation, in which pure cultures of a mould, instead of 

 diastase, are used for the purpose of saccharification 

 and fermentation, thus being accompanied by a pure 

 symbiotic fermentation on the addition of yeast. Dr. 

 Macfadyen corroborates many of Calmette's observations 

 on this point. Mr. Joseph Lunt enumerates and de- 

 scribes a series of eleven organisms of the bacillus Coli 

 communis group, which he has been able to isolate from 

 drinking water, &c. ; and Dr. Arthur Harden contributes 

 a short note on the action of hydrogen peroxide and the 

 oxides of copper on formaldehyde. 



