those obtained by Lombroso and others, but Di Pietro considered them characteristic of pellagra. Di Pietro also tested the toxic properties of Penicillium glaucum on himself, and suffered from pyrosis, vomiting, giddiness, weakness in the legs, slight tremor of the arms, frequent micturition. Lastly, in 1904, Fossati declared that he induced pellagra by feeding or inoculating guineapigs with maize damaged either by Aspergillus fumigatus or Penicillium glaucum. These results are mutually contradictory.
(e) Micro-organisms found on maize.— Ballardini, in 1845, was the first to attribute pellagra to a living organism, a mould (Sporisorium maydis}, which he found in the greenish stain (verderame) frequently seen in the germ-groove of maize grains. Experiments gave rise to gastritis and diarrhoea in man, loss of feathers and general wasting in fowls. Lombroso pointed out that Sporisorium maydis, on account of its rarity, could not be the cause of pellagra, and that Ballardini had probably confounded the Sporisorium with Penicillium glaucum. A special commission reported against Ballardini's discovery, on the ground that the verderame was common in many non-pellagrous districts of Italy. However, notwithstanding this, Ballardini' s theory was accepted by many in Italy, and by Roussell and Costallat in France.
In 1860 Pari incriminated the maize smut (Ustilago maydis), pointing out that the spores of this fungus are invariably present in the dust of the hovels of the peasants, who store their maize in the rooms in which they sleep . Generali fed two horses on fodder mixed with the maize smut, and claimed that after seven months one of the animals presented a skin eruption on the parts most exposed to the sun. But Prof. Imhof, who made some experiments on himself, proved that the maize smut is harmless to man.
In 1881 Majocchi found in both normal and diseased maize a very motile micro-organism which he named Bacterium maydis. He claimed to have found this organism in the blood, brain, liver, heart, kidneys, lungs, intestinal mucosa, and erythematous skin of pellagra patients, and on these grounds brought it forward as the causative agent of the disease, Cuboni found a similar bacillus in damaged maize and in the stools of pellagra patients. Paltauf, who investigated pellagra in 1889 on behalf of the Austrian Government, examined fifteen patients, but found Cuboni's bacterium in the stools of one only. However, he found it to be a very common saprophyte of damaged maize, and, together with Heider, proved that the maize toxins were partly due to the metabolic action of this organism. At the same time he showed that Bacterium maydis is no other than the well-known potato bacillus (Bacillus solanacearum) and that its toxic effects do not resemble pellagra.
In 1896 Carrarioli also claimed to have found a bacillus in the blood, saliva, and stools of pellagra patients. He stated that he had inoculated the toxic products of this organism
