2 
Anaplasma-like Bodies 
In the blood of the above mammals there was found in varying 
proportions those enigmatical bodies recently described by Theiler* as 
Protozoa under the name Anaplasma marginale, but more generally 
known as “ marginal points ” or “ coccus-like bodies.” 
The parasitic character of these masses of chromatin was not regarded 
as proved by Bruce and others^ writing somewhat earlier, though still 
considered possible. 
Their importance is considerable in the light of Dr Theiler’s claim 
that they are the specific cause of a cattle disease, transmitted by cattle 
ticks, to which disease he has given the name of Anaplasmosis, as being 
distinct from South African Redwater caused by Piroplasma higeminuin, 
though Texas Fever of the Americans is said by Theiler to be a com¬ 
bination of the two diseases now claimed to be separated by him in 
South Africa. In this connection it is interesting to note that one of 
us (S. D.) has occasionally noticed the coccus-like bodies in the blood of 
animals affected with Piroplasmosis in Queensland, but he has not been 
able to satisfy himself that they were the same as the “ marginal points ” 
with which he was familiar in South Africa. 
The presence of these bodies, or of bodies indistinguishable from 
them, has been noticed by Bruce and others^ in healthy young rats, 
goats, calves, etc. One of us (J. A. G.) has already recorded the presence 
of what he now recognises as similar bodies in pigs affected with con¬ 
tagious pneumonia in New Zealand® as “small bodies like very short 
cocco-bacilli and cocci, sometimes in pairs, staining deeply, lying free, 
but also other bodies within the red corpuscles. These intra-corpuscular 
bodies were fairly numerous, sometimes six to eight affected corpuscles 
being in one field. Circular in outline, they varied in diameter from a 
small coccus to twice the size of an ordinary Staphylococcus. They were 
almost invariably situated to one side of the cell-centre. In smears 
fixed in alcohol and stained with Giemsa they were more readily 
observed. They coloured deeply and uniformly with the blue. Fre¬ 
quently a distinct zone, unstained or but very faintly blue-stained, was 
pi’esent between the circular blue-stained bodies and the pink bodies of 
the erythrocytes. Occasionally two bodies were found within one cell.” 
Some experiments detailed in the above report were carried out which 
1 Journ. Compar. Pathol, and Therap. Vol. ■xxiii. pt. (2), June 1910, p. 108; and 
Transvaal Dept, of Agric., Farmers' Bulletin, No. Ill, 1910, p. 7. 
^ Reports of the Sleeping Sickness Commission of the Royal Society, No. x. 1910, 
pp. 100, 101. 
^ nth Report Dept, of Agric. New Zealand, 1909, p. 302. 
