170 DR. C. G. SELIGMANN ON DEATHS [Feb. 19, 



35'8 in 1905. Assuming that there were about 100 monkeys in 

 the house on January the 1st, 1906, between 16 and 17 per cent, 

 of the inmates of the house have died of tuberculosis during the 

 past year, since the actual number of monkeys received was 105. 



My thanks are due to Mr. Pocock for ascertaining the number 

 of admissions during the year, and I am further indebted to him 

 for the estimate of 100 as the niimber of monkeys in the house 

 in January 1906. 



Much attention has been paid to tuberculosis in birds, and 

 certain interesting conclvisions concerning avian tuberculosis can 

 be drawn from a study of the material available. It must in the 

 first place be noted that during the past two years about 30 per 

 cent, of all deaths in birds have been due to tuberculosis ; and the 

 more the matter is investigated the moi-e obvious it becomes that 

 a very large percentage of the cases of tuberculosis occurring in 

 birds in the Zoological Gardens are the result of infection by the 

 intestine, which can hardly be due to any other cause than the 

 swallowing of particles of contaminated soil while food is being 

 picked up. By far the greater proportion of birds dying of 

 tuberculosis in the Gardens present typical lesions in their spleen 

 and liver, which can only be explained on the hj^pothesis of an 

 ingestion tuberculosis : sometimes the intestine is afi:ected, but 

 more often this is not the cavse, and typical tubercular ulceration 

 of the gut in birds dying in the Gardens is rare. But although 

 ulceration of the gut does not frequently take place, enlarged 

 tuberculous glands at the root of the mesentery are by no means 

 uncommon ; a condition akin to tabes mesenterica of human 

 pathology being set vip without obvious damage to the mucous 

 membrane of the gut, but with the addition of lesions in the 

 spleen or liver or both. Even where the intestine is affected, 

 ulceration is rare or slight ; comparatively lai-ge submucosal 

 nodviles being formed over which the villi of the mucous mem- 

 brane often seem enlai'ged, so that a curious condition suggestive 

 of multiple closely-set wai-ts is found to occupy the inner sui-face of 

 the bowel. Sometimes, as in a Vulturine Guinea-fowl (Acryllhom 

 vidturinibvi), the whole of the large gut may be thickly studded 

 with these warty growths, which on section are found to 

 contain dense masses of acid-fast bacilli. In other cases the 

 whole of the small gut is similarly affected, as in a Burmese Slaty- 

 headed Parakeet (Palceornis sp.). In the latter case it was inter- 

 esting to note that there were no lesions in any other abdominal 

 organ or in the thorax, while in the case of the Guinea-fowl there 

 was early tuberculosis of the lung, liver, and spleen. 



Pneu77ionia and Broncho-pneumonia. — No marked improvement 

 in these diseases has followed the cleaning of the monkey-house. 



Mycosis. — Reference was made last year to the occurrence of a 

 disease, mycosis, which was due to the invasion of the tissues by 

 a mould, AspergillvjS fimiigatus. This disease is by far commoner 

 in water-fowl than in other birds, and when attacking these its 

 charactei'istic lesions are usually widely distributed throughout 

 the body-cavity ; but a case occurred in an African Buzzard (Buteo 



