Jg ON THK FECULA OF GREEN PLANTS. 



V, Let us now examine the fecula by tefts more adapted t* 

 difclofe die new characters of animalifation. 



The fecula pu- j£ ,* n fu mra er, the fecula, either boiled or raw, be kept 



animal body. underwater, in lefs than twenty -four hours it yields a dif- 

 agreeable fmell, and foon exhales an excrementous fetor which 

 continually increafes, and, to which it might be dangerous to 

 be long expofed. The infectious miafma anting from it, in- 

 ftantly difcolours metallic writings ; and its liquor, which may 

 be compared to a cadaverous fanies, alfo rapidly blackens 

 plates of filv.er. 



Steeping of flax. It is, without doubt, from the corruption of this principle, 

 rather than from any other caufe, that the pernicious exhala- 

 tions from hemp and flax, while fleeping, arife. Running 

 waters, which are equally proper to feparate the flax as ftand- 

 ing ones, quickly carry off their extractive juices; there can 

 only remain the fecula intangled in the green fibres which is 

 fufceptible of being deftroyed by fleeping. 



The liquor, which at the end of a year, remains above the 

 rotten fecula, contains fulphurated hidrogen, carbonate of 

 ammonia, and gluten diflblved by the intervention of the latter 

 principle. 



The liquid very This liquor has alfo this peculiarity, that it prefer ves its 



cor { at nately fter " ]ftercoral fmdl after lon S boiling. The produft of its diflilla- 

 tion contains carbonate of ammonia, combined with a prin- 

 ciple of infection, which does not blacken metallic folutions, 

 and with the nature of which I am not at all acquainted* — 

 Acids, by precipitating the fecula and faturating the ammonia, 

 do not weaken it ; this has, for a long time, induced me to 



The infe&ion think, that though the effluvia from a mats of animal putrefac- 



trefyi'nz bodies. ^ on ma ^ ^ erve as a vemc * e to tne phofphorus and fulphur con- 

 tained in it, yet thefe combuflibles are not alone, the caufe of 

 the infection. For there is a great difference, for example, 

 between the fmell of rotten fifh or flefli, of corrupted fecula, 

 of ftinking cheefe, and thofe of phofphorated and fulphurated 

 hidrogen. 



On Putrefaction. 



What, then, is putrefaction ? A change of which we have 

 very few clear ideas. 

 Putrefaction is When fecula, curd, flefh, or any organic matters in general, 

 not destruction, ^ yQ p a fl* e( j through a certain period of this change, which we 



are 



