224 DISEASES OF TRUE INFECTION. 



from animals affected with this disease has beea tried, and often, 

 as a rule, produces the disease artificially. 



Semmer believes that he has defiuitely defined the contagious 

 germ in the blood, and also found it in the lungs, liver, and 

 spleen, in the form of small, dagger-shaped microbes, which he 

 calls the " bacilli of distemper." Rabe has found in the secretion 

 of the nose and connective tissue, also in the blood, small cucci 

 which accumulate in heaps, or are generally together in small 

 groups of three or four in a superficial sac-like manner, or they 

 may hang together like a string of beads. In some cases they 

 take the form of a light, thin membrane, which is easily colored 

 by methyl-violet. He consideri these as the specific infecting 

 agent of distemper, but this theory is one that Friedberger does 

 not agree with. Mathis found in the mucus contained in a pustule 

 a diplococcus which could be colored with fuehsine. He used 

 bouillon cultures of this for the inoculation of dogs. These 

 were affected by symptoms which resembled very closely those of 

 distemper. Marcone and Meloni found a micrococcus in the 

 dog which was affected by distemper, and considered that this 

 agent was the true pathogenic fluid, as it produced the skin 

 eruptions, broncho-pneumonia, and gastro-enteritis in dogs which 

 had been inoculated with pure cultures. Legrain and Jaquot 

 obtained pure cultures of micrococci, when held in certain medi- 

 ums, from fluid obtained from the bladder in the exanthematic 

 form of distemper. These were gathered together and in the form 

 of diplococci and short chains, In dogs vaccinated with these 

 cultures the skin eruption, with the development of pustules, was 

 seen only, but the subjects so treated seemed to enjoy immunity 

 from the disease. Millais made cultures from the nasal excretion 

 of the dogs affected by distemper upon gelatinous cocci of two 

 various bacilli, which, on inoculation, produced distemper. [Galli- 

 Valerio has isolated ovoid bacilli two micro-millimetres in length 

 which grow freely in gelatin. These he found in abundance in 

 the lungs and central nervous system, but did not find them in 

 the blood. The inoculation of the cultivations produces charac- 

 teristic distemper in puppies, but did not give the same results in 

 adult dogs. This he accounts for in that they may have had pre- 

 vious attacks of the disease, and were thus protected.] 



Direct vaccinating methods have been practised by various prac- 



