470 THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



charred to a similar extent. Infusions of mutton, 

 however, were scarcely altered in colour by this tempe- 

 rature or by the higher one of 464 F, and only a small 

 amount of a light flocculent precipitate was thrown 

 down. But on opening these flasks, the mutton infu- 

 sion in each case presented a very strongly ammoniacal 

 and otherwise unpleasant odour, and was also alkaline 

 in reaction. The organic compounds had, therefore, 

 been differently decomposed in these cases in the hay 

 and turnip infusions more or less pure carbon had 

 been liberated, whilst the mutton solution probably 

 broke up, in the main, into ammonia and carbonic 

 anhydride. Seeing that the organic matter was so 

 thoroughly destroyed in these infusions, there was not 

 much chance that any mere shreds of it should 

 have escaped uninjured in the tubes which contained 

 various saline solutions. And in those experiments 

 in which the tubes and their solutions were raised to 

 the temperature of 464 F, all the disadvantages were 

 further augmented by the extreme amount of corrosion 

 of the tubes, which took place even when the hardest 

 Bohemian glass was employed. 



Confining ourselves, therefore, to a consideration of 

 the experiments in which the closed flasks containing 

 the experimental fluids have been heated to tempera- 

 tures ranging from 27o-3O7F^ the results arrived at 

 must be looked at from two or three different points 

 of view. 



