The semi-colon in bash is the statement terminator. If you do not use a semi-colon then your statement is terminated by a newline. Both the semi-colon and the newline can be escaped. This is all to do with bash and nothing to do with perl.

As examples try these:

• $ echo foo
• $ echo foo;
• $ echo foo\;
• $ echo foo; echo bar
• $ echo foo\; echo bar

Happy bashing!