28 MEETING OF [NSPECTORS OF A1TAR1KS. 



tained in ;i journal to which few bee keepers can have access. It is 

 a- follows: 



On Angusl 11th, 1884, Mr. Cheshire broughl to me a piece of comb containing 

 larva 1 affected with foul brood, with which I performed the following experi- 

 ments: Selecting cells which were closed, bu1 which Mr. Cheshire thought con- 

 tained diseased larva?, I brushed them over with a watery solution of bichloride 

 of mercury (1:1000) to destroy the organisms on the outside With several 

 forceps, that had been heated and allowed to cool, the covering of the cell was 



picked Off so ;is to display the diseased larva?. These larva? were dead, of a 



yellowish color, and almost liquid, and on examination afterwards their juices 

 were found to contain numerous moving bacilli. By means of a heated platinum 

 wire, tubes of meat infusion rendered solid by gelatin (in per cent), or by 

 Japanese Isinglass, were inoculated from several of these larva? and kept :it a 

 suitable temperature. Development of bacilli, microscopically similar to those 

 seen in the juices of the larva?, occurred. The characteristics of this develop- 

 ment will hi> presently described. Further, in the tubes, kept at the body 

 temperature, there was not only a development of bacilli hut also of spores. 



These bacilli, a- -ten in the larval juices, measure about :i , 1 „-|7 inch in length and 

 , inch in breadth. They are rounded or slightly tapering at their ends and 

 have a clear space near one end. In the juices of the larva' during life 

 they apparently do not produce spores, although after death spores abound. 



In the cultivation in the peptonized meat infusion, rendered solid by agar-agar, 

 the bacilli vary considerably in size, their average length being - } , inch, some be- 

 ing as small as l7 ;- MM1 inch and others as large as ^Vff inch. When they have at- 

 tained the latter size, division of the rod seems to begin. They are always somewhat 

 pointed at their ends. Their average breadth is ^-J--^- inch, varying from ;; .-, -J -j-j to 



i 

 ■ 



The -poic- are largish oval bodies, averaging in length j^ir inch I varying from 

 inch), and in breadth ^^ m( ' n (varying from ; : to _ ; inch |. 



In the aga'r-agar material the spores are generally arranged side by side in 

 long rows, and in old cultivations only a few bacilli can be seen, some forming 

 spores, some without any indication of spores. That these small bacilli can 

 produce such large spores seems a1 the first glance at a microscopical specimen 

 almost inconceivable, but 1 have been able to trace on the one hand the develop- 

 ment of the spores in the rods, and on the other the sprouting ^>\' the spores into 

 adult bacilli. This can be done in the following very simple manner: 



Take a number of glass slides, each having a moderate-sized cell hollowed 

 oul in its middle: clean it and pass through a Bunsen flame several times to 

 destroy any bacteria on its surface. With a brush apply a little vaseline around 

 the depression, and then place the slide under a glass shade to keep it from 

 i he dust, ('lean a number of cover glasses, purify them in the flame, and place 

 them on a pure glass plate beneath another shade. With a fine, pure pipette 

 put a small drop of sterilized cultivating fluid (meat infusion with peptone) on 

 the center of each of these cover glasses; then with a fine platinum wire inocu- 

 late each of the drops with the spores, or with nonspore-bearing bacilli : rapidly 

 invert them over the cell, press down the cover glass so as to diffuse the 

 vaseline around its edge, and place the slides in an incubator kept at the 

 temperature of the body. These slides are removed ;it different intervals of 

 time, and as soon as each is taken out the cover glass is turned over and the 

 drop of fluid rapidly dried. The specimen can then be stained, mounted ill 

 Canada balsam, and studied at leisure. This method seems to me to be much 

 more satisfactory than the observation of the organisms swimming aboul in 



