BACILLUS 8P0B0GENES. 347 



(Gram's, blue with iodin), motility, and spore-formation. 

 The flagella are located at the ends especially in little 

 bunches; the motion is sluggish. Also, in the edema no 

 long threads are formed. The growths possess no mor- 

 phologic value. According to v. Hililer, gelatin is slowly 

 liquefied. Brain nutrient media is very slowly darkened. 

 Milk is very rapidly decomposed, with vigorous formation 

 of butyric acid and gas. ^ According to Klein, no spores 

 are formed in milk in fourteen days, but they readily 

 develop upon serum. Spores withstand 100° for one hour. 



Subcutaneous injection kills guinea-pigs in eighteen to 

 forty- eight hours, with the development of a wide-spread- 

 ing, foul-smelling edema, containing abundant bacilli, and 

 gas. Sometimes there is injection of the intestine and 

 peritonitis. The spleen is not enlarged, and usually con- 

 tains only a few bacilli and no threads. 



In man the taking of milk which contains these bacilli 

 in abundance causes severe gastro-intestinal disturbances 

 (enteritis). So far, such occurrences have been observed 

 only in England. 



According to Klein, the bacillus is widely distributed in 

 milk, intestinal contents of children and in cases of diar- 

 rhea, in street dirt, sewage, horse manure, etc. 



Diagnosis. — The differential diagnosis from sympto- 

 matic anthrax is decidedly more difficult than from ma- 

 lignant edema. Attention must be paid to the presence 

 of bacteria in the bile in symptomatic anthrax. 



Other w^riters have described other producers of butyric 

 acid. We give here, accordingto Klecki (C. B. L. ii, 286), 

 a comparison of three of them with the Bacillus butj-ricus 

 Botkin. The literature is found in the same place. 



' According to Klein, if spores are repeatedly transferred from 

 sugar-gelatm to sugar-gelatin, the organism loses the ability to form 

 gas abundantly in milk; the milk remains alkaline and has a foul 

 odor. The bacillus forms long, sporulating threads instead of the 

 short members of the typical form; the virulence is almost or entirely 

 lost (C. B. XXII, 581). If there has been no mistake here, and that 

 seems improbable, then these observations are of very great significance, 

 since they show how characteristics upon which two species were for- 

 merly based occur as two forms of one culture. 



