278 TEXT-BOOK OF BACTERIOLOGY. 



a man having cholera morbus. But Finkler and Prior did not find 

 it Immediately after the discharge, but only when the watery and 

 offensive excrements had been preserved for nearly fourteen days, 

 and hence subjected to further decomposition. Nor can the fact, 

 likewise reported by Finkler, that he had found his bacterium in 

 seven cases of cholera morbus immediately post-mortem serve as 

 a -decisive proof of its significance; for numerous other observers 

 have established the contrary and been unable to find Finkler's 

 vibrio in cholera morbus in spite of all care and precision. 



While the appearance of the micro-organism in cholera morbus 

 is by no means universal, several results have, on the other hand, 

 plainly demonstrated that it is found in cases in no way related to 

 the disease just mentioned. Kuisl has discovered it in the intestine 

 of a suicide, and Miller, of Berlin, has obtained from the hollow 

 tooth of an otherwise healthy man a kind of bacterium agreeing in 

 every respect with Finkler's vibrio, and which is regarded as iden- 

 tical with it. We are, therefore, justified in looking upon the vibrio 

 described by Finkler and Prior as a more or less frequent and harm- 

 less tenant of the human digestive canal. 



IX. DENEKE'S VIBRIO. 



Decidedly similar to the genuine comma bacillus is a kind of 

 bacterium cultivated by Deneke (Gottingen) from old cheese and 

 mentioned here on account of its appearance, though otherwise it 

 is unimportant. 



They are neatly-curved bacteria, frequently growing out into 

 spirilla, actively motile, and hardly distinguishable from the cholera 

 vibrios by microscopic investigation. They grow like the vibrios, 

 at ordinary as well as at breeding temperatures, they are similarly 

 intolerant of oxygen, and are equally stained by anilin colors. 



On the plate, however, their development proceeds very differ- 

 ently. Their growth is considerably more rapid than that of Fink- 

 ler's bacteria. The colonies first appear to the naked eye as small 

 round dots in the depth of the gelatin. They then rise to the sur- 

 face and begin to liquefj' the medium. On the second day they are 

 about the size of a pin's head, and of a distinctly yellowish color; 

 they lie in the gelatin at the bottom of the funnel-shaped depres- 

 sion caused by them. The plate when looked at from the side ap- 

 pears to be studded with small air-vesicles, and greatly resembles, 

 at the first glance, a cholera plate. 



The colonies appear under the microscope as irregularly-formed, 

 coarse-grained masses, of a marked yellowish-green color in the 



