Dry-rot; Venoms; Viruses 845 



Experiment CCCCLXXXVIII. July 19. Plums beginning to ripen. 



A, normal pressure. 



B, 15 superoxygenated atmospheres. 

 July 26. Decompressed. 



A, are eatable, softened, and quite yellow. 



B, have become a dark brown color; remained very hard, ex- 

 tremely acid, with the odor and taste of cooked plums. 



The two examples are sufficient to show very clearly that the 

 ripening of fruits is a vital act, due to a certain cellular evolution, 

 and consequently essentially different from dry rot, with which it 

 is often confused. 



I call attention to this cooked taste which fruits acquire under 

 the influence of compressed oxygen. It was noted in the experi- 

 ments of Subchapter I, in reference to the development of mold. 

 It is evidently due either to an exaggerated oxidation or to the 

 effect of a diastatic pseudo-ferment. 



3. Venoms. 



The only venom upon which I could experiment is scorpion's 

 venom, the dried vesicles of which I kept for several years; it came 

 from the Buthus occitanns (Amor.) and had been sent me from the 

 south of Algeria. 



Experiment CCCCLXXXIX. December 2. Twelve dried scorpion's 

 vesicles; they are crushed with a little water; then they are subjected 

 to the pressure of 18 superoxygenated atmospheres. (The liquid is 

 neutral, and has no effect upon starch.) 



December 8. Decompression. The liquid part (A) is inoculated 

 under the skin of a big rat, and a part of the solid fragments, crushed 

 in water (B), is inoculated subcutaneously on the left thigh, at the 

 level of the sciatic nerve, of a young rat. 



A quarter of an hour later, I look at rat A, and am much sur- 

 prised to see it already on its side, its eyes are watering and lack 

 sensitivity, its breathing is slow and difficult, its heart is beating 

 irregularly. It has, especially in the hind legs, very strong tonic 

 convulsions, which become remittent, and the animal dies in about a 

 half -hour. The muscles for some moments have exhibited very strange 

 fibrillary movements. The nerves no longer have any power over the 

 muscles. 



The lungs are quite healthy; the blood in the heart is dark, on 

 the left as well as on the right; the heart is in diastole; the blood 

 turns red in the air and coagulates very well; the corpuscles are 

 intact; rigor mortis comes on very quickly. 



Rat B is affected a half-hour after the inoculation. 



At first, cries indicating local pain; then general palsy, slowness 

 of motion; respiration very irregular, sometimes remains 5 or 6 seconds 

 without breathing; the pulse follows the respiration. 



