Water for Bacteriological Analysis. 21 
and rapid enough in its working to enable me to obtain a 
large number of individual samples. 
My first attempt was made with the assistance of Dr. R. 
F. Ruttan. We prepared a set of wide-mouthed bottles, 
fitted with perforated corks in which two open glass tubes 
were fitted. ‘To one of the tubes a long rubber tube was 
attached, the end being guarded by a stop-cock. The 
bottles, with their glass tubes attached, were sterilized by 
dry heat and the rubber tubing was stezmed separately for 
several hours. After sinking the bottle to the required 
depth by attaching a weight, upon opening the stopcock 
the water displaced the air in the bottle. The method 
seemed to give accurate results, and in each case a bit of 
the tubing reserved for the control test of washing it out 
with sterilized water yielded no bacteria colonies. The 
sterilization seemed to be perfect, but the method was 
abandoned as it was found too troublesome to sterilize a 
separate length of tubing for each sample that was to be 
taken. 
I had obtained by this time some collecting bottles from 
Messrs. Kimer & Amend of New York. These were made 
of very heavy glass and held about a pint, the stoppers con- 
sisting of a rubber ring fitted round to a glass rod which 
lay within the bottle, and was so arranged that the stopper 
could be pulled up against the lower part of the neck from 
within by means of a wire attached to the glass rod. 
In using this bottle one line was attached to the neck of 
the bottle and one to the wire fastened to the rod shaped 
stopper. The bottles were lowered by this second line, 
thus holding the stopper tightly against the neck of the 
bottles and so preventing the water from enterin&, until, 
at the desired depth the strain was taken off the stopper by 
pulling in the line attached to the neck of the bottle 
_ allowing it to fill, the stopper being heavy enough to fall 
from its own weight. This was open to the obvious objec- 
tion that the neck of the bottle above the rod shaped 
stopper filled with water from the surface, most of which 
was afterwards naturally washed into the bottle. Besides 
