362 PA THOGENIC BACTERIA.

Sometimes the bacillus enters the body through a.
wound, cut, scratch, or fly-bite. This is especially the
case with men who come in contact with diseased cattle.
As has already been pointed out, a malignant pustule
is apt to follow, and may cause death. Men whose
occupations bring them in contact with skins and hair
from animals dead of anthrax are not only liable to
wound-infection, but are sometimes the subjects of a pul-
monary form of the disease—uwool-sorter's disease"—
caused by inspiration of the spores attached to the wool.

The disease as we see it in the laboratory is accom-
panied by few but marked lesions. The ordinary method,
of inoculation is to cut away a little of the hair from,
the abdomen of a guinea-pig or rabbit or the root of
a mouse's tail, make a little subcutaneous pocket with
a snip of a pair of sterile scissors, and introduce the
spores or bacilli from a pure culture upon a rather heavy
platinum wire, the end of which is flattened, pointed,,
and perforated. An animal inoculated in this way gen-
erally dies, according to the species, in from twenty-four
hours to three days. The symptoms are weakness, fever,
loss of appetite, and sometimes a bloody discharge from
nose and bowels. There is much subcutaneous edema.
At the autopsy very little change is observed at the seat
of inoculation. The subcutaneous tissue beneath it for
a considerable distance around is occupied by a peculiar
colorless gelatinous edema which contains the bacilli.
The abdominal cavity shows injection and congestion
of its viscera. The spleen is considerably enlarged, is
dark in color, and of mushy consistence. The liver is
somewhat enlarged. When the thorax is opened, the
lungs may be slightly congested, but otherwise no
changes are to be found.

When the various organs, which present no appreciable
changes to the naked eye, are subjected to a microscopic
examination, the appropriate staining methods bring out
a most remarkable and beautiful change. The capil-
lary system is almost universally occupied by bacilli,.