274 GLANDERS. 



the eighth day it has a reddish-brown or chocolate colour, 

 while the potato at the margin of the growth often shows 

 a greenish-yellow staining. The characters of the growth on 

 potato along with the microscopical appearances are quite 

 sufficient to distinguish the glanders bacillus from every 

 other known organism (sometimes the cholera organism 

 and the B. pyocyaneus produce a somewhat similar 

 appearance, but they can be readily distinguished by their 

 other characters). The potato is also a suitable medium 

 for starting cultures from the tissues ; in this case minute 

 transparent colonies become visible on the third day and 

 afterwards present the appearances just described. 



Powers of Resistance. The glanders bacillus is not 

 killed at once by drying, but usually loses its vitality after 

 fourteen days in the dry condition, though sometimes it 

 lives longer. It is not quickly destroyed by putrefaction, 

 having been found to be still active after remaining two or 

 three weeks in putrefying fluids. In cultures the bacilli 

 retain their vitality for three or four months, if, after growth 

 has taken place, they be kept at the temperature of the 

 room ; on the other hand, they are often found to be dead 

 at the end of a month when kept constantly at the body 

 temperature. They have comparatively feeble resistance to 

 heat and antiseptics. Loffler found that they were killed 

 in ten minutes in a fluid kept at 55 C, and in two to 

 three minutes by a 5 per cent solution of carbolic acid. 

 Boiling water and the ordinarily used antiseptics are very 

 rapid and efficient disinfectants. 



We may summarise the characters of the glanders 

 bacillus by saying that in its morphological characters it 

 resembles somewhat the tubercle bacillus, but is thicker, 

 and differs widely from it in its staining reactions. For its 

 cultivation the higher temperatures are necessary, and the 

 growth on potato presents most characteristic features. 



Experimental Inoculation. In horses subcutaneous 

 injection of the glanders bacillus in pure culture reproduces 

 all the important features of the disease. This fact was 

 established at a comparatively early date by Loffler and 



