48 INFECTIONS OF THE DIGESTIVE TRACT 



studies on suitable media show that the flora is in 

 reality more varied and that forms physiologically im- 

 portant are present of which one obtains no suggestion 

 from the fields alone. Such a picture, taken by itself, 

 is misleading in certain respects, but representative in 

 others. The microscopic fields of the faeces showing 

 mainly one form represent with a fair degree of accuracy 

 the bacterial conditions in the faeces, for here the other 

 types are in reality very feebly represented. The cul- 

 tural methods which it is almost impossible to employ 

 in such a way as to make them give an accurate insight 

 into the actual quantitative relations of the bacteria 

 present, might easily mislead one into supposing that 

 the subsidiary varieties thus brought to light are more 

 abundant in the faeces than is actually the case. But 

 if we look at these cultural results as indications, not of 

 the quantitative relations of the faecal flora, but rather 

 as indices of the conditions prevailing at higher levels 

 of the large intestine, where one type is no longer so 

 dominant, these results become instructive instead of 

 confusing. 



Distribution of the Bacterial Flora in the Digestive 

 Tract of the Nursling. Although the distribution of the 

 bacteria of the digestive tract in normal or approximately 

 normal nurslings has not yet received much attention, 

 it is a subject which cannot be ignored, for it is capable 

 of giving us information in regard to the nature of the 

 decompositions that are possible at different levels of 

 the tract in health, these decompositions being often of 

 a different nature in disease from those which occur in 



