426 
SUMMARY OP CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 
bacteria take to reach the blood is also very variable, though it was 
fairly well ascertained that an infection of a bleeding wound may 
remain local for about 2^ hours (anthrax). 
The chief histological changes were haemorrhage, exudation of fibrin, 
hyperplasia, presence of leucocytes, pus-cells, and bacteria. 
Excretion of Bacteria by the Animal Body.* * * § — Dr. F. J. Cotton 
made a series of experiments on animals for the purpose of ascertaining 
under what conditions, at what time, and in what quantity, bacteria are 
excreted in the bile, and by the intestine after intravenous injection. 
The animals employed were rabbits, and the bacteria selected were 
B. anthracis, subtilis, prodigiosus , and Pneumoniae , Staphylococcus aureus , 
and Diplococcus pneumoniae. 
Suspensions in bouillon of fresh agar cultures were injected into an 
ear vein, and the animals killed at various intervals. Cultivations were 
then made from the different secretions and viscera. From the results 
of his experiments the author concludes that certain bacteria, if present 
in large numbers in the blood, may be excreted by the bile without any 
perceptible changes having previously taken place in the liver or bile 
ducts, but the presence of large numbers of bacteria in the bile is almost 
necessarily associated with pathological changes. So too with regard 
to the intestine and the urine, the presence of bacteria in their case is 
evidence of pathological changes in the intestine or in the urinary tract. 
Pathogenic Water Bacteria.^ — The most prominent feature of Prof. 
IT. M. Ward’s report on the bacterial flora of the Thames is that many 
river bacteria are pathogenic or become so on culture, and that patho- 
genicity, like other characters, is variable. The author’s work includes 
the consideration of some eighty forms, which for investigation purposes 
are aggregated into groups. Each of the groups contains a type, which 
is regarded by the author as probably a species of which the other 
forms included are varieties. The massing into groups was the outcome 
of finding that slight extrinsic and intrinsic changes, i.e. alterations 
in the cell or its environment, w r ere immediately followed by distinct 
and often marked variations in the colonies and inferentially in the 
individual cells, and that characters derived from the behaviour of 
-colonies are not sufficient for the determination of species. The report 
also points out that the effects of definite changes in the environment 
on the media and on the growing organism are important, and that this 
importance is not sufficiently recognised. 
Micrococci of Malaria.* — Dr. L. Facciola describes appearances 
which he has observed in the blood of malarious persons, and depicts 
these appearances very copiously. The bodies observed vary consider- 
ably in size and shape, and from the illustrations have nothing in common 
with Micrococci except the name. 
Plague Bacillus.§ — From observations made during an epidemic of 
plague in Formosa, Prof. M. Ogata thus summarises his results. In the 
lymphatic glands of plague patients, and in the organs and blood of 
* SB. K. Akad. Wiss. Wien, cv. (1896) pp. 453-512. 
+ Proc. Hoy. Soc., lxi. (1897) pp. 415-23. 
% Atti Soc. Toscana Sci. Nat., xv. (1897) pp. 220-9 (84 figs.). 
§ Centralbl. Bakt. u. Par., l te Abt., xxi. (1897) pp. 769-77. 
