284 GLANDERS AND RHINOSCLEROMA. 



marked. Veterinary authorities are practically unanimous as to the great 

 value of the mallei n test as a means of diagnosis. We cannot as yet speak as 

 to its applicability to diagnosis of the disease in the human subject. 



Methods of Examination and Diagnosis. — Microscopic exam- 

 ination in a case of suspected glanders will at most reveal the 

 presence of bacilli corresponding in their characters to the 

 glanders bacillus. An absolute diagnosis cannot be made by 

 this method. Cultures may be obtained by making successive 

 strokes on blood serum or oh glycerin agar (preferably the 

 former), and incubating at 37" C. The colonies of the glanders 

 bacillus do not appear till two days after. This method often 

 fails unless a considerable number of the glanders bacilli are 

 present. Another method is to dilute the secretion or pus with 

 sterile water, to varying degrees, and then to smear the surface 

 of potato with the mixture, the potatoes being incubated at the 

 above temperature. The colonies on potatoes may not appear 

 till the third day. The most certain method, however, is that of 

 Straus by inoculation of a male guinea-pig, either by subcutane- 

 ous or intraperitoneal injection. By the latter method, as above 

 described, lesions are much more rapidly produced, and are more 

 characteristic. If, however, there have been other organisms 

 present, the animal may die of a septic peritonitis, though even in 

 such a case the glanders bacilli will be found to be more numer- 

 ous in the tunica vaginalis, and may be cultivated from this 

 situation. Frothingham recommends injection of the suspected 

 material into not one guinea-pig, but three or four, leaving a 

 small portion of the injection beneath the skin ; by so doing 

 there is less chance of failure due either to increased resistance 

 on the part of one animal, or to lessened resistance towards 

 the organisms in another causing an early fatal peritonitis. He 

 also warns one against a negative diagnosis being made unless 

 several tests have been executed. In the case of horses, etc., a 

 diagnosis will, of course, be much more easily and rapidly effected 

 by means of mallein. 



Rhinoscleroma. 



This disease is considered here as, from the anatomical 

 changes, it also belongs to the group of infective granulomata. 

 It is characterised by the occurrence of chronic nodular thick- 

 enings in the skin or mucous membrane of the nose, or in the 



