Repeated confirmation of the discovery of the specific bacillus of true diphtheria has stimulated renewed clinical as well as bacteriological study of other pseudo-membranous inflammations of the tonsils, pharynx and nose, so that our literature of the past few months has contained numerous accounts of "Tonsillitis Lacunaris," "Angina Follicularis," "Pharyngitis Fibrinosa," "Pharyngitis Phlegmonosa," "Rhinitis Membranosa," etc.; a group of diseases which cannot be said to be as yet sufficiently and accurately described, for in some respects they closely resemble diphtheria while in other features they differ widely from that disease.
The opinion of bacteriologists that in these affections diphtheria can only be excluded positively by the absence of the Klebs-Loeffler bacillus, as determined microscopically, is doubtless correct as applied to a few border-line cases, yet one should not permit this fact to engender neglect of macroscopic signs and clinical symptoms upon which a differential diagnosis may also be made, usually