176 MICROBES, FERMENTS, AND MOULDS. 



III. THE VIRULENT MICROBE OF HEALTHY HUMAN 

 SALIVA. 



Pasteur and Vulpian in France, and Sternberg in 

 America, discovered almost simultaneously that the 

 human saliva may, under conditions with which we 

 are still imperfectly acquainted, become virulent, and 

 that this virulence is due to the action of a Micrococcus, 

 normally present in the saliva, a microbe quite distinct 

 from that of rabies, of which we have already spoken. 



It is only known that this micrococcus is very 

 common in the saliva of a healthy man, and that in 

 some individuals the saliva is exceptionally virulent. 

 When injected under the skin of healthy rabbits, it 

 produces grave affections, often resulting in the animal's 

 death. These affections are due to the presence of 

 the micrococcus, since the saliva becomes harmless as 

 soon as these organisms are removed from it. 



Sternberg informs us that his own saliva is 

 among those which possess this curious and alarming 

 property. He regards the more abundant nutriment 

 which this microbe finds in the mouths of some 

 persons as the cause of this virulence, since thus its 

 development is more energetic. " In my own case," 

 he writes, "there is a very abundant secretion of 

 saliva. . . . My culture experiments show that this 

 micrococcus multiplies very rapidly, and in virtue of 

 this faculty it has for a certain time the advantage 



