38 



Staining Reactions of Gametes' (Malignant 

 Tertian) 



• Argutinsky," who has lately studied this 

 question of stippling by means of a modification 

 of the Romanowsky stain comes to the following 

 conclusions. By his ihethod he is unable to obtain 

 stippling of the young asexual forms, which we 

 have ourselves often obtained, and which-MAURER 

 also confirms, but he obtains stippling of ."the red 

 cell infected by the adult gametes (crescents). 

 These forms were also seen by us in West: Africa 

 while using a very active haematein stain ;^ but 

 they are certainly not shown by the usual Roman- 

 ■'owsKY methods in use. Argutinsky's results 

 depend upon his fixative acetic-osmic vapour; 

 while then he differs in not having obtained stip- 

 pling of cells containing ordinary ring forms, yet 

 his criteria for distinguishing the gametes agree 

 with those generally received. With regard to 

 the stippling in the mikrogametocyte (male) there 

 is a single peripheral row of finer and less intensely 

 stained dots than in the red cell surrounding the 

 makrogamete. The rim of red cell surrounding 

 the parasite is also narrower in the case of the 

 male. 



Quartan Gametes. — Presumably similar differ- 

 ences exist as in other forms of the parasite, but 

 they have' not yet been described, and, in fact, 

 gametes are often very rare in quartan Cases. 



Note. — Gametes (crescents) may be but rarely found in 

 the blood of Europeans in the tropics (West Africa). 



I C.fur Backteriologie, Bd. xxxiv, S. 144. 

 2 Reports to the Malari.1l Committee. Harrison & Sons. Series iii, p. 8. 



