276 APPLIED BACTERIOLOGY 



Then the parasite undergoes segmentation, and we have 

 developed from ten to twenty segments, arranged round the 

 more or less central clump of pigment like a daisy or rosette 

 (Fig. 21—4). Soon the bodies so formed break out of their 

 corpuscular hosts and break up (Eig. 21—5). The spores, 

 which are round or oval bodies about 1 /i in diameter, enter 

 red blood corpuscles and again go through the same cycle 

 of changes, repeating the growth and sporulation. In 

 addition to these spores, and the intra-corpuscular bodies 

 described, which appear to constitute the regular stages in 

 the development, there are others, namely, the flagellated 

 bodies and the crescentic organisms. 



Flagellated Bodies. — If malarial blood be examined under 

 the microscope for some time, it occasionally happens that 

 certain more or less circular bodies with long flagella are 

 seen. So far as is known, these flagellated bodies do not 

 occur in the circulating blood, but only in the blood when 

 it has got outside the body. They may be derived from 

 the large intra-corpuscular pigmented spherical bodies, or 

 from spherical bodies evolved from crescents. In either 

 case the pigment granules become arranged in the form of 

 a central ring, and afterwards show a peculiar vibratory 

 movement which is apparently caused by the flagella which 

 have formed within the sphere. At this stage the flagella 

 shoot through the walls of the envelope of the sphere. 

 The flagella, which are usually from three to six in number, 

 are very delicate, actively moving filaments often having a 

 bulbous swelling at their ends. They frequently break 

 away and swim free in the blood. 



The Crescentic Bodies. — If we examine the blood of a 

 malarial patient who has been suffering for some time from 

 one of the malignant forms of the infection — what has been 

 incorrectly called sestivo-autumnal fever — in addition to 

 those forms of the parasite already described as being 



