80 



about thirty five ycars ago, I classed them as Protista, and then I 

 ceased to look for them as I did not expect to find, either eggs, ova 

 or seeds. 



In 1872 a controversy arose hearing on the beginning of life 

 and it was waged by Bastian on the one hand a host of oponents 

 on the other, Huxley, Tyndall and Pasteur being the principle ones. 

 Again now in 1903 they are published by Bastian in his Studies 

 in Heterogenisis. But they are unanswered and I beleive unanswc- 

 rable. For I am a beleiver in archebiosis. 



Among the substances that I gathered when looking for Bacil- 

 jaria about 55 to 5o years ago was the green scum that occurred 

 on the outside of red clay flower pois were the sun seldom comes. 

 And this scum I have looked at over and over again. I looked at 

 it in New York years ago and in Newark to day. I have not seen 

 it in the island of Jamaica nor in the Bermudas, which places I 

 visited. Nor in Florida where I was for some time. In California, 

 where I resided for two years, likevvise I did not see it. But perhaps 

 I did not look for it in the right place. Making the observations on 

 the green scum that is on the red clay flower pots in the shade 

 and commonly in greenhouses I found the same. I made these ob- 

 servations hundreds of times. I also made observations of mud that 

 canne from the bottoni of the Second River in Montclair, N. J. when 

 I was looking for Bacillaria. 1 likewise found the same thing when 

 examining the soil in my garden at Newark and elscwhere. 1 first 

 saw this as I say sixty years ago and then it made me think that 

 animals propagated by some other means than making ova. 1 know 

 that this will be thought that observations are premature and extraor- 

 dinary in a boy of that age. But they made an impression on me and 

 I distinctly remember it. I thought that animals propagated by ano- 

 ther means. Of course I did not know spontaneous generation or 

 even archebiosis them, but 1 kept the matter in mind and when I 

 could I read everything that I could get on the subject. I also made 

 observations myself to confimi or refute what 1 learnt in books. For 

 this early I doubted the observations of others. I saw one made an 

 observations and another made a totally different observation. This 

 made me doubt the published observations. And made me, or at 

 least it shewed me that I was an observer myself. It made me a 



