482 



SCIENCE, 



[Vol. V., No. 123. 



ferent places, as from gardens, rooms, barracks, sick- 

 chambers, stables, and out-houses. With this dust 

 was sown neutral bouillon sterilized by heat, and 

 cooked potato, with the result of finding many curved 

 bacilli in all the cultures. 



3°. The curved bacilli do not exist in their charac- 

 teristic form in 'atmospheric dust:' they are there 

 present in the germ or spore condition. In fact, if 

 this 'dust' be examined immediately after dilution 

 with sterilized distilled water, very few curved bacilli 

 can be made out ; and these are hardly recognizable as 

 such, being changed in appearance by the development 

 of one or more spores at their ends, or somewhere in the 

 middle of the rod. This sort of change is precisely 

 what is seen in cultures. If what happens in these 

 drops of diluted dust be observed from day to day, the 

 number of curved bacilli will be seen to vastly in- 

 crease until the third or fourth day, when the spore 

 formation recommences. 



4°. The presence of curved bacilli in water, and of 

 their spores in the air, furnishes a sufficient explana- 

 tion of the presence of these organisms wherever air 

 or water can penetrate. 



Intestinal dejections in simple diarrhoea, as well as 

 in dysentery and typhoid-fever, broncho-pulmonary 

 secretions in all diseases of the lungs, from simple 

 catarrh to advanced tuberculosis, pus exposed to the 

 air, the saliva of a sick or well man, — all substances, 

 in fact, which can nourish the germs of bacteria, 

 contain the curved bacilli, and oftentimes in much 

 greater number than the other bacteria, which are 

 also found in such culture-media. The mud of the 

 streets, made up of dust and water, can also be con- 

 sidered to be a favorable medium in which they are 

 numerous and active. 



5°. These micro-organisms are decidedly aerobie, 

 and only flourish on the surface of liquids. They are 

 mobile, moving with the rapid oscillations of vibrios, 

 and very refractive. They are easily colored by 

 methyl violet in watery solution, and, thus stained, 

 show all the described forms, — commas, curves, ome- 

 ga, S, spirals, etc. In general, they are from one-half 

 to two-thirds as long as the bacillus of tuberculosis, but 

 are thicker and less regular than these: in fact, no 

 peculiarity of form or staining distinguishes them 

 from the bacilli found in cholera dejecta. Sowiug 

 the bouillon with dust proves that the spores, whose 

 formation was observed as above, are their resting 

 stage : moisture seems to be the condition indispensa- 

 ble to their perfect development. 



6°. Collected first on bouillon or cooked potato, and 

 then cultivated on nutrient gelatine, these curved 

 bacilli form rounded colonies with serrated edges 

 composed of highly refractive granules. These colo- 

 nies, kept at 20°-22° C, grow in the gelatine, and 

 liquefy it, finally producing a colony of the shape of 

 a glove-finger. 



7°. Until conclusive inoculation experiments shall 

 be made, proving the pathogenic properties of the 

 curved bacillus of cholera, the conclusion to be 

 reached is, that these latter are the same as are found 

 in all secretions, normal or pathological, provided 

 these have come in contact with water, which is the 



normal habitat of curved bacilli, or with air, which 

 furnishes transportation for the germs. 



[These experiments are exceedingly interesting, but 

 no proof is offered to show the exact correspondence 

 of the curved bacilli spoken of, with those of cholera. 

 Johne's work (Science, June 5, 1885) speaks of the dis- 

 tinctive difference between Koch's comma bacillus 

 and that of Finkler and Prior; and this latter will 

 answer to all of the description given by Hericourt 

 of the curved bacilli he has observed.] 



HYPODERMIC INJECTION OF CUL- 

 TURES OF CURVED BACILLI. 



In" a paper on the effects produced in man and 

 animals by the ingestion and hypodermic injection 

 of cultures of the bacteria of choleraic diarrhoea 

 [Comptes rendus, 1885, 1148), are given some inter- 

 esting results obtained by Bochefontaine in experi- 

 ments made with cultures obtained from choleraic 

 diarrhoea in peptonized gelatine. 



The first generations were found to liquefy the 

 gelatine with a cup-shaped depression terminated by 

 a deep point. None of the cultures contained the 

 curved bacillus alone; but always, and in greater 

 number than this, were found rods or spirilla fully 

 developed. There were never found in the cultures 

 the very short, rapidly moving bacteria which filled 

 the watery discharges in cholera. Every successive 

 generation showed an increase in the number of the 

 simple curved bacilli. 



I. The author has on four different occasions swal- 

 lowed pure cultures of the curved bacillus of the third 

 and fourth generation without ill effect. 



II. Two adult guinea-pigs were inoculated in the 

 flank with a fourth of a centimetre of a mixture of 

 equal parts of water and gelatine containing the cul- 

 ture : both were found dead the next morning. The 

 autopsy showed great effusion on the inoculated side 

 and opposite abdominal wall, with nothing in the in- 

 ternal organs. Two other guinea-pigs were inocu- 

 lated with an eighth of a centimetre of the same 

 mixture, and the smaller one died in twenty-four 

 hours, with appearances similar to the first two. The 

 second showed no symptoms. Microscopic examina- 

 tion of the blood of the three dead animals showed 

 nothing. The same injection was made in two larger 

 guinea-pigs, with no result. 



III. The experimenter injected three-fourths of a 

 centimetre of the mixture under the skin of his left 

 fore-arm, with the result of much oedematous swell- 

 ing and some pain, with deep fluctuation in the re- 

 gion of the puncture, three days afterwards. Black 

 blood obtained from this point showed no bacteria,, 

 either microscopically or upon cultivation. 



The inferences that the writer draws are, that the 

 ingestion of the cholera microbes produces no un- 

 pleasant symptoms; that their hypodermic injection 

 will produce local symptoms if in sufficiently large 

 dose ; and that the blood of man and animals under 

 normal conditions will destroy cultures of the bacteria 

 of choleraic diarrhoea. 



