76 ELEMENTS OF WATER BACTERIOLOGY. 



the conclusion was drawn that the migration of fish from 

 a contaminated stream or lake to an unpolluted one may 

 explain the occasional finding of B. coli in small samples, 

 or the more regular detection of it in large volumes of the 

 water. 



Many bacteriologists have gone much further and 

 affirmed that the colon bacillus was not a form character- 

 istic of the intestine at all, but a saprophyte having a wide 

 distribution in nature. The first of this school, perhaps, 

 was Kruse (Kruse, i8o4),who in 1894 protested against the 

 arbitrary conclusions drawn from the colon test as then ap- 

 plied. He pointed out that the characters usually observed 

 marked, not a single species, but a large group of organisms. 

 As ordinarily defined, he added, "the Bacterium coli is in 

 no way characteristic of the feces of men or animals. 

 Such bacteria occur everywhere, in air, in earth, and in 

 the water, from the most different sources." Even if the 

 relations to milk and sugar media be considered, "micro- 

 organisms with these characteristics are also widespread." 

 Dr. Kruse gave no experimental data on which his opinion 

 was based. In the same year Beckmann (Beckmann, 

 1894) isolated a bacillus which he identified by pretty 

 thorough tests as B. coli from the city water of Strass- 

 burg, a ground-water which he believed could by no pos- 

 sibility be subject to fecal contamination. Large quan- 

 tities of water were used for the isolation. 



Refik (Refik, 1896) recorded the constant presence of 

 colon bacilli in water of all sorts, public supplies, wells, 

 cisterns, and springs in the neighborhood of Constant!- 



