ANOMALIES OF LACTATION. 



433 



According to Hueppe's recent researches, it appears in the shape of 

 colorless rods, which are very mobile and from 2 to 4 ^ ^ongj and 

 which muhiply by segmentation or sporulation. In sterilized milk 

 (suppression of the vitality of the lactic ferment) it produces a gray, 

 slaty, or dull-blue coloration ; in bouillon, peptonized gelatin, etc., 

 it determines green colorations, which afterward deviate to brown- 

 ish, and become blue through the action of oxidizing agents. If 

 cultivated on potato it gives a bluish-gray coloration. It de- 

 composes albumin and produces a coloring matter which is similar 

 to aniline-blue. The penetration of this bacillus into the udder 

 and the alteration of the milk before leaving these organs are yet 

 to be demonstrated. Contamination seems to operate by the 

 intermediary of air and by flies. 



Milk which is very albuminous, a condition due to an alimenta- 

 tion rich in protein, or very alkaline, and which has but slight, 

 slow, or want of coagulating properties, is predisposed to this 

 alteration, contrary to what is observed in acid milk. According 

 to Haubner and Siedamgrotzky, it often appears under the influ- 

 ence of a changing of food, through an abrupt change from certain 

 food to another, from a dry to a green diet, especially when the 

 pastures have received a dusting from plaster ; it disappears, on 

 ihe contrary, when the animals are led into spare pastures. Hueppe 

 thinks that certain diets, diseases of the udder, etc., by retarding 

 t]]e acidification of the milk, may have a certain influence upon its 

 production. 



Characters. The phenomena which announce this anomaly are 

 peculiar, and have been well described by Fuchs : one or two days 

 after milking, when the milk commences to curdle and to become 

 acid, we see upon the surface of the cream layer small, irregular 

 spots hardly the size of a pin-head and of a clear blue color, which 

 take little by little an indigo or sky-blue shade ; they become ex- 

 tended in width and depth, invade the whole creamy surface, even 

 the coagulated milk, the mass of which is sometimes colored 

 blue. Some days later the blue milk is transformed into putrid 

 milk by the development of microbes of putrefaction and of moulds; 

 then it is of a dirty-gray shade. The alterations of albumin and 

 fat give it an abnormal consistence, the casein becomes softened, 

 the butter it produces resembles beef-suet, turns rancid, and soon 

 «hows blue spots or bands, often surrounded by a zone of greenish 

 reflex. 



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