6 DIFFERENT KINDS OF GERMS. 



from the vegetable kingdom (Bacillus anthracis), namely, the rod- 

 like fungus of anthrax, a fatal disease, chiefly attacking animals 

 such as the horse and ox, and sometimes man. These infecting 

 particles resemble, as you see, minute rods. They grow into 

 fibres, then fructify, each one producing a number of spores, which 

 are the oval bodies seen in the diagram. In this disease, these 

 germs infest the tissues and blood of the infected animal or per- 

 son, and live, grow, and multiply at the expense of the tissues 

 and blood. If now the blood containing these rods and spores 

 be filtered, it becomes harmless, that is, it will not infect another 

 animal. But, on the contrary, these bodies will cause the disease 

 in its most virulent form. 



This diagram shows a drawing of a section of skin in erysipelas, 

 an infectious disease of a rapidly spreading nature, characterised 

 by great inflammatory swelling and redness (hence named St 

 Anthony's fire). The dotted portions indicate the lymph vessels 

 and spaces, the dots representing minute vegetable spores 

 (micrococci) crowding the spaces. There is no longer any doubt 

 that diphtheria is a disease essentially due to the presence of 

 similar parasitic organisms. 



This other diagram furnishes an example of another kind. It 

 exhibits the spirilla of relapsing fever,* sometimes called famine 

 fever, from its occurrence during periods of scarcity. You readily 

 distinguish the organism existing among the blood-corpuscles by 

 its spiral or corkscrew appearance. This fever relapses for a 

 week, then suddenly re-appears for a week, and so on, hence its 

 name. The spirilla is found in the blood when the fever comes 

 on, and disappears when it goes off, and finally disappears, when 

 the sufferer recovers thus proving its connection with the disease. 



Another discovery has lately been made by Professor Klebs 

 throwing much interesting light on the causation of marsh or 

 malarial fever. He found a species of vegetable organism exist- 

 ing in the air of the Pontine marshes, which, when injected under 

 the skin, produced that fever. Further proof of the connection 



* Obermeysr. 



