40 Veterinary Medicine. 



found them covered with actinomyces. This was in Poltava 

 where the grains are especially liable to be attacked by this para- 

 site. Elsewhere Bodamer found the parasite abundantly on 

 grain, Jensen on rye, Brazzola on the hordeum murinum, and 

 Johne and Piana on the glumes of wheat. 



Direct infection from actinomycotic animals has been doubted, 

 and even denied, yet in view of the many cases of successful in- 

 oculation it cannot be considered as impossible. It must be 

 allowed that persons are usually about equally exposed to infec- 

 tion from the diseased animals and from the original sources of 

 infection which acted on the animals themselves. It must also be 

 admitted that of the many exposed to actinomyces from either 

 vegetable or animal source but a very small proportion contract 

 the affection. Casewell's experience of 17 affected in a herd of 

 80 on a farm near Peoria, Ills., is altogether exceptional. Usually 

 but one or two are found in a herd where the disease has existed 

 for a length of time. 



A certain amount of circumstantial evidence, however, supports 

 the theory of its transmission from one animal victim to another. 

 Oschner cites the cases of two farmers who contracted the disease 

 after treating diseased cattle, and a lumpy-jaw horse. Barnard, 

 O'Neil, Bergman and Munch quote cases of men suffering after 

 long attendance on diseased cattle, and Baracz quotes a case of 

 apparent transmission from man to man. 



In view of the occurrence of actinomycosis in connection with 

 the intestines, it must be admitted as a possible result of eating 

 the infested food, vegetable or animal, yet direct experiments by 

 feeding such food to animals have not proved successful. Man is 

 largely protected by the cooking of his food. 



In man as in animals a very large proportion of cases originate 

 from the implanting of the parasite in a wound, so that it must 

 be looked upon as, in the main of traumatic origin. 



Localization of Actinomycosis in Man. Judging from 

 recorded cases actinomycosis is by far the most common in or 

 near the upper part of the alimentary canal, and next in the 

 chest, abdomen and skin. Among a number of cases, 78 were in 

 the head, neck or oesophagus, 32 in the viscera and walls of the 

 chest, 30 in the abdomen, 10 in the skin and 2 in the brain. In 

 the head the following parts suffered : the teeth, alveolge, jaw- 

 bone, cheek, intermaxillary space, tongue, lachrymal sac and 



