1. An epidemic of a dysenteroid nature, largely ambulatory, due to B. dysenteriae (Sonne), affecting some 100 nurses without transference to any hospital case in the wards served by this section of the nursing staff, is described.

2. Sonne's bacillus was isolated from sixteen out of forty-two cases examined.

3. The probable cause was infection of food during preparation in the kitchens by a carrier.

4. A case of infection from laboratory cultures is described.

5. Notes are given of investigations upon the colonial appearance, biochemical and agglutinogenic reactions and pathogenicity to rabbits of the organism isolated, and also upon the presence of agglutinins in the blood of infected cases.

6. One case of infection in a rabbit by feeding experiments is described.

1. Fletcher and Lesslar's observations on two serological types of tropical typhus have been fully confirmed.

2. The antigenic relationship between the indologenic B. proteus X 19 and the non-indologenic Kingsbury strain is of the same order as that obtaining between the X 19 and X 2 types of B. proteus X.

3. The Kingsbury strain is an antigenic variant derived from the original X 19 culture and represents another serological type of B. proteus X. The symbol XK is suggested for this type.

4. Sera from cases of classical European typhus and of endemic typhus of the United States of America and of Australia have been tested for the occurrence of main and group O agglutinins for the known types of B. proteus X.

5. H agglutination as source of error in the diagnosis of typhus cases is illustrated by some examples.

6. Sera from cases of tsutsugamushi from Sumatra and Japan react with type XK like the Malayan cases of this disease described by Fletcher and co-workers.

7. This latter reaction is of the order of group O agglutination. It is suggested that antigenically the virus of tsutsugamushi corresponds to another serological type of B. proteus X which is yet unknown.

8. The data published on the serum reactions in Rocky Mountain spotted fever and in the “fièvre exanthématique” of Marseilles are analysed. It is suggested that these two diseases represent further serological varieties of typhus.

9. The significance hitherto attached to negative agglutination tests with B. proteus X and to negative cross-immunity tests obtained with some typhuslike diseases requires revision in the light of recent observations.

1. Most artificial manures are found to have some effect in increasing the iodine content of crops, particularly superphosphate.

2. Marked differences are found between the iodine contents of Samoan and New Zealand foodstuffs corresponding to the non-goitrous condition of Samoa and the partial endemicity of New Zealand.

3. Investigation of the dietaries of fifteen residential institutions showed that improvement in provision of iodine was necessary in many cases by using fish at least twice a week, raising the daily ration of milk to 1 pint per head, and employing iodised salt for table and culinary purposes.

4. Dietetic experiments indicate (i) that on a change of diet adjustment of iodine metabolism may take a considerable time, (ii) that iodised salt is most effective in promoting storage of iodine when associated with a meat diet.

5. Iodine excretion is found to decrease much more rapidly under fasting than on a diet very low in iodine.

6. Iodised salt has the effect of adjusting the excretion of goitrous adults to the normal non-goitrous value.

7. The iodine content of the blood is found to be lower than normal in cases of simple colloid and simple nodular goitre, though it may range from low to abnormally high in cases of Graves' disease. In all types of goitre the thyroid gland is low in iodine.

8. The ratio of thyroid iodine to total bodily iodine is about 12 per cent. in the case of the white rat under ordinary conditions, but the ratio is found to vary considerably with the iodine intake.

9. Great differences in the ratio of the weight of the thyroid gland to that of the whole body are found among different species of animals, the ratio being higher for the dog than for the monkey.

10. Variations in commercial samples of iodised salts are recorded and discussed.

11. Data are given in regard to the iodine and chlorine content of rainwater in different localities.

1. The occurrence of an exalted strain of rabies virus has been recorded and a definition given of virus de rue renforcé.

2. The characteristics of exalted virus have been examined in respect of incubation time, fixation rate and absence of Negri bodies.

3. An adequate classification of street virus strains has been suggested.

4. Cross-immunity experiments have been carried out and, as a result of cross-protection tests and of crossed serum reactions, identity of exalted virus with the classical strain has been established.

5. The employment of autogenous and polyvalent vaccines has been shown to be unnecessary in anti-rabies immunisation.

During the period 1923–29 inclusive nearly six thousand samples of milk were tested at Wye for both total bacterial count and also keeping quality. An examination of the results shows that on the average the afternoon milks showed nine hours less keeping quality than morning milks of the same total bacterial count, see Table I. The age of the milk on testing for total bacterial count (reckoned from the time of milking) is 27–29 hours for morning milks and 20–24 hours for afternoon milks.

1. The tissue reactions in rabbits from intravenous injections of live and dead Staphylococcus aureus and massive doses of indian ink and colloidal silver have been studied.

2. Any particles injected into the circulation cause the accumulation of polymorphs in the lung capillaries.

3. Inert colloidal particles such as indian ink are clumped in the capillaries of the lungs, liver, spleen and kidneys, and are phagocytosed by the endothelial cells.

4. Staphylococci (S. aureus), live or dead, are nearly all held up in the lungs, where they are actively phagocytosed by the polymorphs within 5 minutes of an intravenous injection.

5. Subsequently the cocci are distributed to the other organs, where phagocytosis continues mainly by polymorphs, but in the liver also by the Kupfer cells.

6. Special attention is drawn to the localisation of the cocci in certain areas in the kidneys.

7. Platelet counting on animals injected with various substances showed that there is an agglomeration of the particles with the platelets, which are consequently removed from the circulation.

8. In the case of the inert particles the platelets are then restored to the circulation. With organisms (S. aureus) some of the platelets appear to be completely removed from the blood together with the bacteria.

1. Refection occurs as a rule in rats receiving diets containing raw potato starch.

2. Rats were maintained for one year on a diet deficient in the vitamin B complex and containing raw potato starch. Two of them attained a weight of almost 300 grm. and made sustained gains at a rate of almost 4 grm. daily.

3. Rapid decline, symptoms of vitamin B1 and B2 deficiency and death were observed in these rats after their diet had been steamed.

4. Steaming under identical conditions does not alter the vitamin B (complex) content of other diets.

In several previous reports we have described the behaviour of communities of mice, submitted over long periods of time to the risks attendant on the epidemic prevalence of a bacterial infection. These communities have been recruited in ways varying both as regards the rate of immigration and the nature of the immigrants.

It is concluded from a study of the morphological and cultural characters of 60 strains of Döderlein's vaginal bacillus that the organism belongs to the lacto-bacillus group of bacteria.

Primary culture of Döderlein's bacillus may be readily obtained on lactose blood agar incubated aerobically provided the vaginal flora is of “Grade A” type, but its subsequent propagation on artificial culture media is less likely to be successful.

Three morphological types of Döderlein's bacillus are recognised. Cultural and fermentative tests show that these types are all biologically similar.

There is no serological homogeneity among the strains of Döderlein's bacillus, although there was some evidence of a serological relationship among the members of the commonest morphological type. The same serological type tends to persist in the vagina throughout pregnancy. Döderlein's bacillus and lacto-bacilli derived from other sources are not serologically identical.

1. In all species of animals tested—rabbit, guinea-pig, chicken and horse—normal agglutinins for B. agglutinabilis U2 are far more abundant than those for B. proteus X 19.

2. Human serum reacts in the same manner. Wassermann negative sera have been employed as normal sera. Their reaction in Weltmann's globulin test was also negative.

3. Wassermann positive sera from cases of syphilis and sera from lepers give distinctly higher agglutination reactions with U2 than normal human sera. On X 19, however, those sera do not exercise any increased agglutinating action.

4. Similar though somewhat stronger reactions with U2 are obtained with typhus sera. However, this reaction is far from being uniformly positive in typhus, while this is the case with the X 19 reaction.

5. The discordance between these results and those published by Wilson and by Fletcher, Lesslar and Lewthwaite is due to the failure by these workers to employ controls of suitable type.

6. In syphilis and leprous sera high titres of agglutination with U2 coincide with globulin-increase as indicated by the Weltmann reaction.

7. The summation effect of the non-specific agglutination by gelatine and the action of specific immune agglutinins, described by Weil, is again demonstrated.

8. The combined action of an abundance of preformed normal agglutinins and of augmented serum colloids is suggested as one of the factors involved in increased heterologous agglutination (polyagglutination).

9. B. agglutinabilis U2 is a typical representative of “polyagglutinable” organisms; B. proteus X 19, however, is not liable to the action of “polyagglutinating” sera.

Since remote times man has cultivated many kinds and varieties of peas and beans as food for himself and his domestic animals, and with two notable exceptions there has apparently been little suspicion on his part that they might be potentially poisonous or deleterious. The exceptions are the bitter vetch (Ervum ervilia L.) and the vetchling Lathyrus (L. sativus, L. cicera and L. clymenum), the former of which ever since Hippocrates recorded the first known epidemic and the latter since the seventeenth century have been recognised as liable to injure farm animals and to cause in man an incurable paralysis of the legs if eaten in too large quantity as part of the daily dietary. The bitter vetch is now only of limited agricultural importance as a cattle food, but lathyrus is extensively grown in France and southern Europe chiefly as fodder for farm stock and also to some extent for human consumption. The peasants cook and eat it like other pulses and the meal mixed with wheat or barley flour is made into bread, hence in times of scarcity and dear cereals an excessive use of it has often given rise to local outbreaks of poisoning. In India and in Kabylia the peas, whole or ground and cooked in various ways, form the staple diet of large sections of the poorer classes, as they are cheap, palatable, and very nutritious, and in times of famine the increased consumption has been the cause of many recorded pandemics. Apart from famines, however, large agricultural populations in some parts of India subsist to a great extent on lathyrus peas (khesari, teora, matra) and in certain States of North-West and Central India 6 per cent. of the total inhabitants are said to be affected in consequence by paralysis of the lower limbs, and in some of the worst villages 10 per cent. or more of the adult males. The condition has always been well known under various names to physicians practising in the countries affected, but in 1873 Cantani (Naples) gave it the name Lathyrism under which it is now usually described in text-books of medicine. As very large numbers of mankind habitually consume lathyrus peas it may safely be assumed that they are innocuous when taken as a moderate part of a mixed dietary, and Buchanan states that in some Indian jails 4–6 ounces per person have been given daily for years without any bad results having been observed, while on the other hand, Grandjean and others find that when they form almost the whole dietary paralysis supervenes in 4–8 weeks. But the grain varies considerably in its content of toxic substance and the results depend partly on this, partly on the amount eaten, and probably to some extent on individual susceptibility. Men are much more liable to be affected than women, in the ratio of 10 or 12 to 1, and boys than girls. Slight cases of lathyrism show merely a certain degree of motor paralysis and spasticity in the lower limbs which may pass off. In more severe cases the paralysis comes on suddenly and may involve the bladder, rectum, and genital organs, while there may also be pains round the waist, lightning pains, loss of sensation, numbness, cramps, and prickling. All these symptoms, if present, usually clear up with the exception of the spastic paralysis which varies greatly in degree and is permanent. Chevallier (France 1841) mentions somnolence as a symptom, Brunelli, who reported eleven cases which occurred in the neighbourhood of Rome (1880), states that after each meal certain of them showed a kind of transient intoxication, and Desparanches, who described an extensive outbreak round about Blois (1829), says that convulsive movements of the limbs is the earliest symptom in some cases. It is evident therefore that the poison may affect any part of the brain and spinal cord, but that its chief and permanent effect is exercised on the motor tracts from the cortex downwards. The general health remains good, and it does not directly shorten life. Lt.-Col. McCombie Young has published a very clear analysis and explanation of the motor clinical symptoms which makes any further account of them here unnecessary, and Proust's report on an outbreak in Kabylia also gives very full details. No post-mortem examination of the nervous system in man has ever been made.

For the purpose of assessing the effects of exposure to a special environment on a herd of mice, one naturally desires a control series, viz. a herd not exposed to a specific risk but otherwise in pari materia with our colonies under experiment.

As Scotland is the only home country for which information is published on the regional distribution of the mortality from cancer according to site, it seemed of interest to examine whether a particular site, or group of sites, had any special geographical location. With this object in view the present investigation was undertaken for the period 1923–8.

That the number of deaths ascribed to cancer has steadily increased within recent years no one will deny, but as to the causes which have produced the increase there is not the same unanimity of opinion. Thirty years ago cancer did not rank very high in the list of fatal diseases. In 1899 the total number of deaths from cancer amongst persons in England and Wales was 26,325 as against 60,659 allocated to tubercular disease. Nowadays, “the old order changeth yielding place to new.” According to the most recent statistics issued by the Registrar-General, in 1929, the number of deaths assigned to cancer was 56,896 and to all forms of tuberculosis 37,990. In view of this large increase in the number of deaths allocated to cancer it seemed of interest to review the cancer statistics of the last thirty years in this country and in Scotland. No investigation of this nature would be complete without first drawing attention to the very important work already done by Dr Stevenson in the Annual Reports of the Registrar-General, particularly the report for 1917 in which he examined the incidence of cancer in particular sites. The statistics of cancer in Scotland have not, until recently, received quite the same amount of attention as those of England. In a paper read to the Medical Association in Edinburgh and afterwards published in the Journal of that society, Dr Dunlop, the Registrar-General, gave a detailed account of the mortality, according to sites, between the years 1911 and 1928. He compared the actual numbers of deaths in 1920–2 and in 1928 with the numbers that might be expected to occur on the basis of the cancer mortality in age groups which prevailed in 1910–12. His method of analysis conforms partly to that of indirect standardisation.

A. Results following the subcutaneous inoculation of 1400 grm. rabbits with a 2 per cent. suspension of living fixed virus in a dosage of 5 c.c. daily on 14 consecutive days (1·4 grm.):

(1) Fresh living fixed virus introduced into rabbits subcutaneously produces in the sera of these animals so high a degree of rabicidal power that one unit volume of undiluted serum is capable of neutralising, when antibody formation is at a maximum, 16 unit volumes of a 1:100 suspension of freshfixed virus in n.s.s.

(2) Rabicidal properties in the serum are demonstrable 18 days after the commencement of treatment, one unit volume of serum then neutralising one volume of a 1:100 f.v. suspension in n.s.s.

(3) Rabicidal antibody content reaches a maximum between 50 and 60 days after completion of treatment, and thereafter diminishes somewhat gradually.

(4) Immune sera retain their rabicidal properties for a period extending over 222 days, viz. from the 4th to the 226th day after completion of treatment.

B. Results following the subcutaneous inoculation of 1400 grm. rabbits with a 2 per cent. suspension of killed carbolised-fixed virus in a dosage of 5 c.c. daily on 14 consecutive days (1·4 grm.):

(1) Killed carbolised virus administered to rabbits subcutaneously produces a very considerable degree of rabicidal power. The maximum reached, however, falls much short of that attained by immunisation with fresh-fixed virus and is only one-third of that following the use of etherised vaccine, one unit volume of serum neutralising 8 unit volumes of a 1:100 f.v. suspension in n.s.s.

(2) Rabicidal properties in the serum are demonstrable 18 days after the commencement of treatment, one unit volume of serum neutralising one unit volume of a 1:100 f.v. suspension in n.s.s.

(3) Rabicidal antibody content reaches a maximum some 50–60 days after completion of treatment, and thereafter subsides fairly rapidly.

(4) Sera of rabbits immunised with carbolised-fixed virus retain their rabicidal properties for a period of 131 days, viz. from the 4th to the 135th day after completion of treatment.

C. Results following the subcutaneous inoculation of 1400 grm. rabbits with a 2 per cent. suspension of killed etherised virus in a dosage of 5 c.c. daily on 14 consecutive days (1·4 grm.):

(1) Killed etherised virus introduced into rabbits subcutaneously produces in these animals' sera such an extraordinary degree of rabicidal power that, when antibody formation has reached a maximum, one unit volume of undiluted serum is capable of neutralising as many as 24 volumes of a 1:100 f.v. suspension in n.s.s.

(2) Rabicidal properties in the serum are demonstrable on the last day of treatment (14 days after commencement), one unit volume of serum neutralising one unit volume of a 1:100 f.v. suspension in n.s.s.

(3) Rabicidal antibody content reaches a maximum between 50 and 60 days after completion of treatment, and thereafter diminishes fairly gradually.

(4) Sera of rabbits immunised with etherised-fixed virus retain their rabicidal properties for a period of 226 days, viz. from the 14th to the 240th day after commencement of treatment.