70 ANTAGONISM AMONG MICRO-ORGANISMS. 



sides, absorption took place during an attack of facial erysipelas ; 

 no material improvement was observed except that in one case an 

 ulcer healed more rapidly. The author saw tubercular glands in 

 the neck disappear during attacks of erysipelas of the face and neck. 



Bruns (Beitrdye zur klin. Chirurgie, B. iii. Heft 3) has collected 

 twenty-two cases of malignant tumors including one of his own, of 

 melano-sarcorna of the breast, in which a final cure followed an 

 attack of erysipelas. Out of 5 sarcomata, 3 were permanently 

 cured, while the other 2 were diminished in size, but soon 

 returned to their former size. The effect of the erysipelatous 

 invasion proved negative in 6 cases, in which the diagnosis between 

 carcinoma and sarcoma could not be positively made, as also in 3 

 cases of ulcerative epithelioma. It is stated that in cicatricial 

 keloid and lymphomata the attack of erysipelas proved curative. 



Garre (" Ueber Antagonisten unter den Backterien," Correspond 

 denzblattf. Schweizeraerzte, B. x.) has studied the antagonisms among 

 bacteria on artificial culture-soils. He has made many careful ex- 

 periments to determine the growth of a culture of germs on differ- 

 ent nutrient media by removal of the entire culture with a minute 

 spade, and inoculation of the same soil with another microbe. 

 From the results thus far obtained, he has ascertained that some 

 microbes affect the soil favorably for the growth of other varieties, 

 while others render it sterile. For example, a culture-medium 

 impregnated with the ptomaines of the bacillus fluorescens putridus 

 remains perfectly sterile when inoculated with pus-microbes. 

 These investigations have an important practical bearing, as future 

 research may not only show the way to secure immunity from 

 infection by pathogenic microbes by prophylactic inoculations with 

 harmless microbes, but may likewise establish a system of rational 

 treatment by inoculations of cultures of antagonistic bacteria for 

 therapeutic purposes. 



