PART I,] Cyst-like Bodies Found in the Evacuations. x^ 



(Plate IV, Fig. xi, 3). Alcohol being added to another cyst without the iodine, the 

 contents assumed a lumpy appearance with a clear space in the centre (Plate IV, 

 Fig. xi, 4). 



Several very small embryos of round- worms having been observed in the evacuation in 

 active motion (Plate III, Fig. viii, 8), diligent search was made as to their origin, which 

 resulted in the explanation of the nature of the cysts also. The latter were frequently 

 observed to give evidence of some kind of systematic arrangement of their contents, as 

 shown in the figure (viii, 5, 6), and eventually a cyst was observed to contain some- 

 thing which rolled within it ; this, after prolonged watching, was seen to present the 

 exact form and size of the worm-like body just alluded to. It was coiled up on itself 

 within the capsule (Fig. viii, 7), and continually altered its position. This corresponds 

 pretty accurately with the drawing of the ovum of Ascaris mystax in Dr. Cobbold's 

 work on Entozoa. It is, I think, pretty much the same as the cholera-cell of Mr. 

 Swayne. In many cases the contents of these ova are also shrunken, occupying a part 

 only of the enclosing membrane, as insisted on by this gentleman as a means of 

 diagnosis. The effects of re-agents also, as above given, correspond very closely with 

 the description given by him. 



3. There is another cyst not very uncommon in choleraic dejecta, having a more 

 delicate, but very resistent capsule (Plate IV, Fig. xii). Its nature may be inferred 

 from the following statement : On two or three occasions, semi-disintegrated acari were 

 observed in the stools examined, which had, in all probability, been swallowed with the 

 food, in bread perhaps, and passed through the intestinal canal without being very much 

 broken up, as may be seen from the figure (xiii). It did not, however, occur to me 

 to connect the existence of the thin capsuled cysts with these acari, until one day two 

 were seen rapidly depositing their eggs among some fungi under cultivation, which 

 were being microscopically examined. These eggs corresponded precisely with the just 

 described cysts. 



4. Mr. Brittan figures some oblong bodies (Plate II, P'ig. iii, 2), which are not 

 reproduced in M. Eobin's plates, but were probably also considered to have some 

 connection with cholera by the author of the article in the Medical Gazette. These 

 are exceedingly common, and are accurately drawn in Plate IV, Fig. xiv, where one 

 is seen entire, and another ruptured, together with one of Mr. Swayne's bodies in a 

 ruptured condition ; both required the application of considerable pressure before the 

 capsule gave way. The first described elongated body is, I believe, the ovum of 

 another round- worm, the Tricocephalus {disparf). As to the cysts with distinct 

 spore contents, which Hallier has figured (Plate I) as being a mature condition of the 

 cysts comparable to the drawings in Eobin's work, I have not met with any which 

 were unmistakably the same in fresh dejecta, but have developed them repeatedly ; 

 the particulars will be given further on. Other cyst-like bodies are occasionally found, 

 but as they do not in any way correspond to those of the author of the theory under 

 consideration, a description of them is reserved for another occasion ; the principal 



