244 ANNUAL KECOIID OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



persons to banish from science this doctrine of spontaneous 

 generation, -which has nothing whatever to support it." In 

 a recent communication to the British Medical Journal, Pro- 

 fessor Roberts, of Manchester, commenting on Dr. Bastian's 

 claims, states that his experiments are decidedly in favor of 

 Pasteur's conclusions, and, indeed, that to a logical evolu- 

 tionist there would appear to be a strong a priori improba- 

 bility in the abiogenic origin of Bacteria. When Pasteur 

 says that abiogenesis is a chimera, be prudently adds, "in 

 the present state of science ;" and, even thus qualified, the 

 expression is perhaps too strong. But it is absolutely cer- 

 tain that up to the present time no case of abiogenesis has 

 been presented which has stood the test of accurate investi- 

 gation. Dr. Tyndall has recently repeated at Kew, where 

 he found a purer atmosphere than at the Royal Institution, 

 his last year's experiments with perfect success, and with- 

 out the annoying failures due to the atmosphere of the Insti- 

 tution being laden with germs from a quantity of hay, and 

 has thus once more proved his case against Dr. Bastian. In 

 every experiment but one the specimens showed no trace of 

 life; in that one a small aperture like a pin-hole was in the 

 side of the test-tube. Dr. Tyndall's paper is published in the 

 Proceedings of the Royal Society (No. 176). In the Quarter!}/ 

 Journal of Micro scojneal Science for July, Mr. Jeffrey Bell 

 gives an account of recent researches in the history of the 

 Bacteria made by and under the direction of Professor Colin. 

 Professor Tyndall has shown that in air which is optically 

 pure i. e., which will transmit a beam of light without re- 

 vealing its path sterilized but putrescible fluids remain ster- 

 ile. If, however, the same fluids are put in contact with an at- 

 mosphere charged in the ordinary way with motes, they be- 

 come "infallibly smitten" with putrescence. The inference 

 is that germs or spores, or the bacterial equivalents of these, 

 must be among the motes or particles in the atmosphere, 

 and that their development depends upon the deposition in 

 suitable fluids. In order to test this theory, the Rev. W. II. 

 Dallinger has recently made numerous experiments with a 

 sterile putrescible fluid, exposed alternately to an atmosphere 

 charged with organic germs of extreme minuteness and to 

 one optically pure. The results of these experiments are de- 

 tailed in the December number of the Monthly Microscop- 



