84 
SUMMARY OF CURRENT RESEARCHES RELATING TO 
corrected by sections made through the inoculation spot at various 
stages of the disease. Had the inventor of phagocytosis done this, the 
layer of necrotic tissue which separates the bacilli devoted to destruction 
from the leucocytes would not have escaped his notice. In other words, 
they are cut off from the organism by certain morbid anatomical con- 
ditions produced by the action of the bacilli at the spot in question, the 
bacilli and the tissue being destroyed by the poison secreted by the 
micro-organisms. 
Penetration of Glanders Bacillus through the intact Skin.* — From 
inunction experiments made with bacillus of glanders on the uninjured 
skin of guinea-pigs, M. Cornil concludes that the bacilli gain entrance 
through the hair-follicles, whence they pass to the cutaneous lymph- 
spaces. The author infers this from observing that the number of 
bacilli in the central cavity of the follicle is considerably greater than 
in the circumjacent connective tissue. 
The number of animals treated by inunction (the bacilli were mixed 
up with some ointment) was fifteen, out of which two contracted the 
disease. The histological appearances were those of inflammation of 
the skin, most marked about the follicles. The bacilli were stained with 
anilin-fuchsin. 
Can Bacteria be introduced into the body by being rubbed in 
through uninjured skin? j* — In order to answer this question, M. S. D. 
Machnoff selected strong anthrax cultivations on agar, and rubbed them 
into the skin of guinea-pigs. In three cases the agar cultivation alone 
was used ; in four others it was mixed with lanolin. The hair on the 
back was shorn off short, and the mixture rubbed and pressed in with the 
finger protected with a caoutchouc cap. All the seven animals died of 
anthrax in about three days, and in none was there any obvious lesion 
of the skin. In order to meet the objection that the animals had 
possibly been infected by inhaling or swallowing the anthrax, three 
guinea-pigs were smeared over with the lanolin cultivation mixture, and 
all three remained unaffected. Microscopical sections made from the 
skin cut out before death where the inunction had been practised, failed 
to show the presence of bacilli except in small numbers in the hair- 
follicles, and this only after 48 hours of the rubbing. In sections made 
from skin removed after death, many, though not all, show accumulations 
of bacilli in the corium, and these seemed to have distinct relation to 
the hair-follicles and not to the horny layer of the epidermis. From 
these observations the author concludes that it is possible that bacteria 
may be introduced into the animal body through the uninjured skin, and 
that if so their probable path is through the liair-follicles. 
It would have been more satisfactory had mention been made of the 
skin-glands, and if sections had been made from those parts of the skin 
where inunction had not hem practised. 
Effect of Micro-organisms on the Fowl-embryo. J — Herr M. Lederer, 
in making experiments as to the transmission of micro-organisms to the 
* La Semaine Med., 1890, No. 22. See Centralbl. f. Bakteriol. u. Parasitenk., 
viii (18904 pp. 334-5. 
f Russkaja Medicina, 1889, No. 39. See Centralbl. f. Bakteriol u. Parasitenk., 
vii. pp. 441-3. 
+ Mittheil. aus d. Embryol. Institute d. K.K. Univorsitat Wien, 1890, pp. 66-74. 
