80 ABSTRACTS.

PNEUMO-BACILLINE IN THE DIAGNOSIS OF GLANDERS.

PNEUMO-BACILLINE is the name applied by M. Arloing to sterilised cultures of a bacillus which he discovered some years ago, and which he maintains to be the causal germ of pleuro-pneumonia of cattle. He has made experiments to ascertain whether this substance would excite a reaction similar to that set up by mallein in glandered horses. Parallel experiments were made with the two agents on the same subjects, an interval of two to three days being allowed to elapse between the inoculations. The febrile reaction excited by the pneumo-bacilline was found to be the same as that excited by mallein, and was much stronger in the actually glandered horses than in the subjects merely suspected. However, in general the local tumefaction was less voluminous after the pneumo-bacilline than after the mallein.

At the same time the local reaction in the two cases is fundamentally of the same kind, for in one of the experiments in which the animal was visibly glandered an abscess with characteristic farcy pus formed in the centre of the local tumour.-Remeil de MM. VCterillaire.

A CASE OF DISCOMYCOSIS IN A PIG.

ON the 21st July 1892, a year-and-a-half-old pig was brought to one of the German slaughter-houses, with the history that it had been castrated about five weeks previously. Wilbrandt, the Veterinary Inspector, found that it presented the following symptoms before slaughter. In the region of the scrotum there was a swelling as large as the natural scrotum, so that when regarded from a distance the pig looked as if it had not been completely castrated. Manual examination, however, showed that the sac-like structure was the thickened left spermatic cord, which was soft to the touch and imparted a distinct feeling of fluctuation. The whole left leg as far as the hock was greatly swollen and indurated, but not at all painful on pressure.

The animal's temperature was normal. The post-mortem revealed the following conditions :-left spermatic cord

thickened, with a cavity in its interior, filled with a brownish coloured fluid in which larger and smaller granules were suspended.

The muscular tissue of the whole left leg as far as the hock was converted into a firm fibrous mass, which offered great resistance to the knife. In this there were numerous small cavities, varying in size from a pea to a walnut and filled with a grey granular mortar-like material, in some cases mixed with a brownish fluid. Microscopic examination showed that the granules were those of the discomyces.-Zeitsdlrijt fiir Fleisch und Mildlhygiene, January 1894.

THE INFECTIVITY OF THE BLOOD OF TUBERCULOUS CATTLE.

AT the instigation of Bollinger, Hagemann has recently made some experi­ments with the view of ascertaining whether the blood of cattle affected with tuberculosis contains tubercle bacilli. Blood from six such animals was inoculated to guinea-pigs .; in two of these cases the disease was moderately advanced and in the other four the lesions were very extensive. In none of