COCIIIN-CIIINA DIARRIREA. — ThiS iS form of dysentery which occurs in Cochin-China and some other tropical countries. Normand in 1876 found, in the stools of soldiers who returned from Cochin-China to Toulon and who were suffering from chronic diarrhcea, two forms of nematodes (Anguillula sterco rails and Anguillilla intestinalis) after ward shown by- Lena:hart to be the suc cessive generations of a single species to which he gave the name Rhabdonema strongyloides. Further studies have ren dered doubtful its etiological relation to the disease. The parasite is often absent at the beginning of the affection, while it is not infrequently found in the stools of healthy persons. Calmette has studied more recently this form of enterocolitis, and has made it probable that the bacil lus pyocyaneus, alone or in association with the streptococcus, is the cause of many cases. He also demonstrated the bacillus pyocyaneus in the drinking water at Saigon and Gokong. Calmette was able to produce limmorrhages and ulceration of the stomach and intestine in rabbits by injection of cultures of the bacillus pyocyaneus. L. F. Barker has reported several cases, from the Johns Hopkins Hospital, of enteric infection and inflammation caused by this bacillus.
In one instance an extensive diphtheritic inflammation of the o2sophagus, stom ach, and intestine existed. As a cause of diarrhcea and dysentery in infants it has been met with by- Adami and Williams in Canada, and of an epidemic of the same diseases in Albany, N. Y., by Blumer and Lartigan.
In the case of Europeans, a large num ber of species of micro-organisms found, among which are tlie colon bacillus and an amccba. In natives (Coebin-Chinese) the number of species is less numerous, probably as a result of the more simple and almost entirely vegetable diet. Two species regarded as important found: a eoceus having all the properties of the streptococcus erysipelatous and the bacil lus pyocyaneus. A. Calmette (Archives de INI6d. Navale, Sept., '93).
The combination of the colon bacillus and the proteus bacillus is the essential cause. ln northern Europe tbe epidemic is decidedly different from those seen in tropical climates. Chalti» (Archives 1116d. Beiges, Apr., '94).