344 IMPORTANT VARIETIES OF FISSION-FUNGI. 



genie anaerobic bacillus (Oest. Z. f. Veter., v, H. 2 and 

 3) differs in the rapid fermentation of milk and absence 

 of a dark color in brain nutrient media. Klein's new 

 bacillus of malignant edema (C. B. x, 186), and also 

 Sanfelice's Bacillus pseudocedematis maligni (Ann. 

 Inst. d'Igiene di Roma, i, 375), do not liquefy gelatin 

 nor coagulate milk, and darken brain nutrient media 

 intensely. Compare also what is said under Bac. sporo- 

 genes Klein. These findings naturally make the diagnosis 

 of symptomatic anthrax much more difficult. 



Bacillus phlegmonis emphysematosa^. E. Frankel. 1 



Synonym. — Bacillus capsulatus aerogenes Welch? 



Literature. — E. Frankel (C. B. XII, 13; and monograph, Hamburg, 

 1893); P. Ernst (Virchow's Archiv, exxxm, 308); Welch and Nuttall 

 (Johns Hopkins Hosp. Bulletin, July and Aug., 1892; Journal of 

 Experimental Medicine, I, 5, 45); Dunham (Johns Hopkins Hosp. 

 Bui., April, 1897). 



We are very much in doubt whether the producers of 

 1 ' gas phlegmons, " " foaming liver, " " development of 

 gas in the blood and internal organs, ' ' described under these 

 names, are always the same organism, and in what way 

 they are related to other anaerobes. At any rate, con- 

 sidering the variability of bacteria, their identity is possi- 

 ble. All the organisms appear to have the following 

 properties in common: they are plump bacilli, which are 

 occasionally arranged in long pseudoth reads, which present 

 no spontaneous motion, are stained well by Gram's 

 method, and very rarely (best upon blood-serum) form 

 spores, which are observed either at the pole or middle of 

 the bacilli. Welch and Nuttall usually found a capsule, 

 the German writers say nothing about it. Grape-sugar is 

 very rapidly fermented. 



In guinea-pigs emphysematous phlegmon is produced 

 (E. Frankel, Ernst), in which the tissues are often destroyed 

 like tinder. The effect upon mice is variously given. 



1 The name of Welch is a little older, but, in the first place, it is 

 not formed upon the binomial plan, and, in the second place, it is 

 liable to cause confusion, since Bacillus capsulatus has been used 

 repeatedly and there is a bacillus (or bacterium) generally known as 

 aerogenes. 



