Bacillus Dysenteriae 579 



nutrose-agar " of Drigalski and Conradi. A platinum loop, reserved 

 for this particular purpose, and capable of holding about 2 mg. of 

 feces, was employed to emulsify three or more loopfuls of the specimen 

 in 10 c.c. of sterile nutrient broth. Three loopfuls of this suspension 

 were deposited on the surface of a nutrose agar "plate," and then 

 spread evenly over its entire surface by means of a sterile L-shaped 

 glass rod. Two, and sometimes three, other plates were then in- 

 oculated in series, and the whole set of plates incubated at 37 C. for 

 twenty-four hours. At the end of this time such colonies as corre- 

 sponded in their naked -eye appearances, blue coloration, and charac- 

 teristic odor of fresh semen, with those produced by a typical B. 

 dysenteriae (Shiga) were severally emulsified with sterile broth, and 

 tested against a 1 : 1 OO and a 1 : 200 dilution of antidysenteric serum 

 (for which I am indebted to Professor Kolle, of the Institute fur 

 Infektionskrankheiten, Berlin) both macroscopically and microscopic- 

 ally. 



If a good agglutination reaction was obtained within half an hour 

 the organism was grown upon agar, the subsequent growth plated, 

 the organism then isolated and subcultivated in parallel series with 

 an authentic B. dysenteriae (also obtained from Professor Kolle), and 

 its identity or otherwise therewith determined. 



The blood-serum of those suffering from epidemic dysen- 

 tery or from those recently recovered from it causes a well- 

 marked agglutinative reaction. This agglutination has been 

 carefully studied by Flexner, and is thought to be specific 

 and useful for diagnosticating the disease. 



By the progressive immunization of horses to an im- 

 munizing fluid, the basis of which is a twenty-four-hour- 

 old agar-agar culture dried in -vacua, Shiga has prepared 

 an antitoxic serum with which, in 1898, in the Labor- 

 atory Hospital, 65 cases were treated, with a death-rate of 

 9 per cent.; in 1899, in the Laboratory Hospital, 91 cases, 

 with a death-rate of 8 per cent.; in 1899, in the Hirowo 

 Hospital, 1 10 cases, with a death-rate of 12 per cent. These 

 results are very significant, as the death-rate in 2736 cases 

 simultaneously treated without the serum averaged 34.7 

 per cent., and in consideration of the frequency and high 

 death-rate of the disease, Japan alone, between the years 

 1878 and 1899, furnishing a total of 1,136,096 cases, with 

 2 75>3o8 deaths (a total mortality for the entire period of 

 24.23 per cent.).* 



The "epidemic dysentery" is not the same affection as 

 "amebic dysentery," the chief points of dissimilarity being 

 that the extensive undermined ulcerations, described by 

 Councilman and Lafleur, as so characteristic of the latter, 

 are rarely observed. The follicular, pustule-like ulcer is 

 very uncommon; perforation is unusual, the muscular coat 



* " Public Health Reports," Jan. 5, 1900, vol. xv, No. i. 



