1855—1859 85 



be relegated to an uninhabitable garret. Neither did he under- 

 stand the '* economic and hygienic surveillance" attributed to 

 Pasteur. He hoped Pasteur would reduce to their just propor 

 tions those secondary duties. *'They have made him an ad- 

 ministrator, ' ' he said with mock pomposity; ''let them 

 believe that he will administrate." Biot was mistaken. The 

 de minimis non curat did not exist for Pasteur. 



On one of his agenda leaves, besides subjects for lectures, we 

 find notes such as these: "Catering; ascertain what weight of 

 meat per pupil is given out at the Ecole Polytechnique. Court- 

 yard to be strewn with sand. Ventilation of classroom. Dining 

 hall door to be repaired. ' * Each detail was of importance in his 

 eyes, when the health of the students was in question. 



He inaugurated his garret by some work almost as celebrated 

 as that on lactic fermentation. In December, 1857, he pre- 

 sented to the Academic des Sciences a paper on alcoholic 

 fermentation. "I have submitted," he said, *^ alcoholic fer* 

 mentation to the method of experimentation indicated in the 

 notes which I recently had the honour of presenting to the 

 Academic. The results of those labours should be put on the 

 same lines, for they explain and complete each other." And 

 in conclusion: "The deduplication of sugar into alcohol and 

 carbonic acid is correlative to a phenomenon of life, an organiza- 

 tion of globules ..." 



The reports of the Academic des Sciences for 1858 show how 

 Pasteur recognized complex phenomena in alcoholic fermenta- 

 tion. Whilst chemists were content to say: "So much sugar 

 gives so much alcohol and so much carbonic acid," Pasteur 

 went further. He wrote to Chappuis in June: "I find that 

 alcoholic fermentation is constantly accompanied by the produc- 

 tion of glycerine ; it is a very curious fact. For instance, in one 

 litre of wine there are several grammes of that product which 

 had not been suspected." Shortly before that he had also recog- 

 nized the normal presence in alcoholic fermentation of succinic 

 acid. "I should be pursuing the consequence of these facts," 

 he added, "if a temperature of 36° C. did not keep me from my 

 laboratory. I regret to see the longest days in the year lost to 

 me. Yet I have grown accustomed to my attic, and I should be 

 sorry to leave it. Next holidays I hope to enlarge it. You too 

 are struggling against material hindrances in your work ; let it 

 stimulate us, my dear fellow, and not discourage us. Our dis- 

 coveries will have the greater merit." 



