328 MANUAL OF BACTERIOLOGY. 



tetanus spores in his cultures resisted boiling 40 to 70 minutes. 

 This is of importance from the fact that the tetanus spores are 

 so generally distributed in our environment, and that- in dres- 

 sings for wound, in gelatin used for wounds particularly the 

 danger of not properly sterilizing these is imminent. The sub- 

 cutaneous injection of gelatin to check obstinate hemorrhage 

 has been not infrequently followed by tetanus. Tetanus spores 

 were found by Falcioni* to resist two and one-half hours, but 



. 



FIG. 79. One tetanus bacillus (X loco) with pus cocci. Preparation 

 prepared from a fatal case of tetanus in a human being. 



not three hours steaming in a Koch sterilizer. The spores were 

 exposed in this case in 2, 5, and 10 per cent, gelatin solutions. 

 The tetanus bacillus stains by Gram's method. It is a strict 

 anaerobe; it grows in an atmosphere of hydrogen, but not of 

 carbon dioxide. It may sometimes be made to grow very well 

 by Buchner's method. It may be cultivated at the room tem- 

 perature, but better in the incubator. It grows upon ordinary 



*Annali d'Igiene Sperimental. 1904. Quoted by Smith, loc. cit. 



