48

upon gelatine, whereas, after exposure for an hour to a 1 in 50,000 solu-
tion, the growth was as vigorous as in the control experiment. Quinine
impedes the development of anthrax bacilli at a dilution of a 1,200 per
million, and entirely prevents it at 1,600 per million.

What becomes of the microbe in the cadavers, cadaveric debris
water and soil.—In the bodies of animals dead of anthrax, putrefaction,
as we have already seen, is promptly established, because the vibriones of
septicæmia which always exist in the digestive and the air passages, where
they are introduced by food, water and air, not being impeded by the action
of the cellular elements which have lost their vitality too greatly, find
themselves in a particularly suitable medium, more especially as the
bacilli of anthrax have left little oxygen; they consequently rapidly
develop and invade all the organs. For this reason, when we wish to
examine the blood of an animal to decide whether or not he has succumb-
ed to anthrax, it is necessary to do so as soon after death as possible, and
it is also imperative to take antiseptically, as soon after death as possible,
products which we intend to examine later on. A few hours after death
the action of the septic vibriones may mask the result, and the inocu-
lation of a charbonous material which has become septic lead to septicæmia.

In the blood and organs of animals dead of charbon, the bacilli re-
quire air for their existence which is not forthcoming, they find them-
selves in the presence of the carbonic acid given off by the septic vib-
rione, and the temperature not being a suitable one, as a rule, they do
not form spores nor filaments, although they may ocrasionally elongate
in the blood, and they do not consequently develop; they perish more
or less quickly.

So, then, if they do not form spores in the blood of the sick animal,
as we know they do not, it is the same in the cadaver, so long as the
blood does not become exposed to the air; for if after two or three
days we remove blood from a cadaver and heat it to 60º or 70º, a
temperature sufficient to destroy the rods but not the spores, it does not
fertilize a culture sown with it. In the same manner charbonous cada-
vers lose their virulence if anything more surely and more quickly accord-
ing as putrefaction comes on quickly or slowly. Everything which
facilitates putrefaction hastens the destruction of the microbe. The
length of time during which the bacillus anthracis remains alive after
the animal's death varies with the temperature; cold—a temperature
below 10º C.—facilitates its preservation. We may find it living after
four or five days in a moderate climate, and seven or eight days in a cold
climate. Canal has found it living in charbonous meat after eight
days; Nocard has likewise found it living and active after 17 days in
the carcase of a guinea-pig. When the surrounding temperature attains