BIOLOGY. 283 



The Commission also commenced some experiments with an 

 infusion of hay, the liquid recommended by MM. Pouchet, Joly, 

 and Musset, but as the pei'iod of the year declared by those gentle- 

 men to be most favorable for such operations was already passed, 

 their further prosecution has been jDostponed until the coming 

 spring and summer. M. Balard states, however, that such results 

 as were obtained last year seemed to be confirmatory of those of 

 M. Pasteur's experiments. — Reader, 1865. 



Dr. George Child read before the Royal Society a paper on the 

 production of organisms in closed vessels, in which he states that 

 Bacterians are produced "exactly under the circumstances in 

 which M. Pasteur asserts that they do not exist. M. Pasteur, in 

 his Memoir, speaks of examining his substances with a power of 

 350 diameters. Now my experience throughout has been that it 

 is impossible to I'ccognize these minute objects, with any degree 

 of certainty, even with double that magnifying power. I can 

 now have no doubt of the fact that Bacterians can be produced in 

 hermetically sealed vessels, containing an infusion of organic 

 matter, whether animal or vegetable, though supplied only with 

 air passed through a red-hot tube, with all necessary precautions 

 for insuring the thorough heating of every portion of it, and 

 though the infusion itself be thoroughly boiled. It seems clear 

 that either the germs of Bacterium are capable of resisting the 

 boiling temperature in a fluid, or that they are spontaneously gen- 

 erated, or that they are not 'organisms' at all, I was myself 

 spmewhat inclined to the latter belief concerning them at one 

 time ; but some researches in which I am now engaged have gone 

 far to convince me that they are really minute vegetable forms. 

 The choice, therefore, seems to remain between the other two 

 conclusions. Upon these I will not venture a positive opinion, 

 but remark only, that, if it be true that 'germs' can resist the 

 boiling temperature in fluid, then both parties in the controversy 

 are working upon a false principle, and neither M. Pouchet nor 

 M. Pasteur is likely at j)resent to solve the problem of siJontane- 

 ous generation." 



The September and October numbersofthe" Journal de I'Anato- 

 mie et de la Pliysiologie " contain the results of some experiments 

 on spontaneous generation, by M. Al. Donne, which appear to 

 the author favorable to this theory, although for a long time he . 

 has been one of its opponents. He has examined the result of 

 exposing eggs to spontaneous decomposition during some weeks. 

 He argued that, having thus an organized matter highly complex 

 and naturally free from all floating atmospheric germs, — and as 

 this matter contained in itself a certain amount of pure air, — it 

 was in the best possible state to give rise, in its alteration, decom- 

 position, and puti-efaction, to infusoria, or animalcules, the ordi- 

 nary result of the putrefaction of animal matter freely exposed 

 to the air. With a substance naturally free from all foreign mat- * 

 ter, and protected from exterior contact, like the eg^ in the shell, 

 the conditions of a crucial experiment would be realized. Tried 

 in this manner, the results were against the theoiy of spontaneous 

 generation. 



