SPONTANEOUS GENERATION 95 



head to avoid the entrance of germs from his 

 clothes and broke the neck with a sterilized forceps 

 and quickly re-sealed it. Of the 20 flasks so 

 treated only one gave signs of life. By these and 

 other experiments Pasteur showed that air is by 

 no means uniform in its power to generate life in 

 infusions. Where the air is pure and relatively 

 free from floating matter it rarely gives rise to 

 living forms. It is therefore not air that generates 

 life, but something in the air, as Pasteur repeat- 

 edly affirmed. 



The publication of these results stirred Pouchet 

 and his colleagues to renewed efforts in support of 

 their cause. They had affirmed that air taken from 

 anywhere would give rise to life when brought into 

 contact with a proper sterile solution of organic 

 material. They resolved to meet Pasteur on his 

 own ground, and accordingly they also set out for 

 the Alps with a supply of flasks. A party of three 

 investigators, Pouchet, Joly, and Musset, made a 

 somewhat perilous journey to a height considerably 

 above the Montanvert, for they must outdo Pas- 

 teur in the excess of their precautions to obtain 

 pure mountain air. Their flasks which had been 

 partly filled with a boiled infusion of hay (a note- 

 worthy point as we shall see later) were opened 



