DEVELOPMENT OF THE BACTERIA. 123 



bolic acid is sufficient to prevent all development 

 of living beings. It is employed with success in 

 anthrax, in the treatment of wounds, etc. 



§ 3. — Keproduction of the Bacteria. 



It is well established that the bacteria can mul- 

 tiply by fission, and reproduce themselves also by 

 the formation of endogenous spores. 



Fission. — The multiplication by fission consists 

 in a transverse division of the cell. When a bac- 

 terium has attained nearly double its ordinary 

 length, we see, in the larger species, that the proto- 

 plasm becomes clearer in the central portion, and a 

 partition forms in the median line separating the 

 contained protoplasm into two portions. The par- 

 tition, at first very delicate, becomes thicker, di- 

 vides into two, and the two articles separate. 



This phenomenon is produced more or less 

 quickly according to the nature of the medium, 

 its richness in nutritive material, the temperature, 

 etc. When the growth is rapid, the new cells form 

 more quickly than they separate, and are arranged 

 in chaplets. Very often we only find them in 

 this form, in strings of two to four cells coupled 

 together. In some forms the transverse division 

 is preceded by constriction near the middle of the 

 cell. Before the two new cells are separated, the 

 bacterium in this case presents the appearance of 

 a figure 8, and seems to be a simple cell swollen 

 at the two extremities. 



