The term bacteria or microbe refers to particles of matter,
microscopic in size, which belong to the vegetable kingdom, where they
are known as fungi. If we examine a drop of stagnant water under the
microscope, amplifying say four hundred diameters, we see it loaded
with minute bodies, some mere points, others slightly elongated into
rods, all actively in motion and in various positions, a countless
confusion. If evaporation now takes place, all is still. If we now
apply moisture, the dried-up granules will show activity, as though
they had not been disturbed.
All these different organisms have become familiar to us under the
generic term bacteria, which is a very unfortunate application, as it
really applies to only a single class of fungi. Cohn calls them
schizomycetes, and makes the following classifications:
1. _Sphero-bacteria_, or microbes.
2. _Micro-bacteria_, or bacteria.
3. _Desmo-bacteria_, or bacilli.
4. _Spiroteria_, or spirillae.
The _spiro-bacteria_, or micrococci, are the simplest of the fungi,
and appear as minute organisms of spherical form. They multiply by
fission, a single coccus forming two, these two producing four, and so
on.
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