BACILLUS COLI COMMUNIS. 453 
ated with dysentery, probably as a secondary affection, 
as in ameebic or tropical dysentery. It is also found 
frequently in cases of diffuse and circumscribed peri- 
tonitis, appendicitis, etc., either alone or together with 
other bacteria which playa part in the eticlogy of these 
diseases along with certain chemical ferments and toxins 
and foreign bodies in the intestines. The origin of in- 
fections of the gall-ducts (with at times the production 
of gallstones) and multiple abscess of the liver is also 
explained in this way by Dmochowski and Janowski, 
though, according to Letienne, the mere presence of 
the B. coli in the bile, in which it has been found 
under normal conditions, is not sufficient to account 
for these affections. Puerperal fever is not infre- 
quently caused by the colon bacillus by infection of 
the vagina or uterus. Other diseases to which the 
colon bacillus seems to stand in a certain relation, 
though rarely, are: Endocarditis, meningitis, tropical 
abscess of the liver, bronchopneumonia and an irregu- 
lar type of lobar pneumonia, fetid bronchitis, chronic 
amygdalitis, and abscess of the lachrymal sac. The B. 
coli has been found in a case of urethritis (pseudo- 
gonorrhea) lying inside the cells like gonococci, and it 
is often associated with the pyogenic cocci in cutaneous 
and subcutaneous purulent inflammations. 
In the above-mentioned diseases the colon bacillus 
has been found either alone or associated with other 
pathogenic bacteria in such numbers as to be con- 
sidered a factor in the etiology of the disease, and in 
some cases there is no reason to doubt that it is the 
primary cause of infection. Though further study and 
investigation are required to show the specific patho- 
genic properties of this micro-organism, it is evident 
