310 Mr. Coleman and Prof. McKendrich [May 29, 



These experiments ended on 28th December. On the 29th one 

 bottle from each group was again exposed to — 80° F. ( — 63° C.) for 

 six hours, then again frozen for six hours at — 80° F. ( — 63° C). The 

 whole of those were removed to the room, but in the meantime it 

 was noticed that at temperatures below zero, and particularly so 

 low as — 80°F. (— 63° C), the meat assumed a peculiar dirty-brown 

 appearance. In the course of a few hours, however, the whole 

 of the samples assumed at normal temperatures the well-known 

 reddish colour of meat. In all cases, however, in the course of ten 

 or twelve hours after removal to the warm room, signs of putrefac- 

 tion were visible, and in the course of a few days, the putrefactive 

 process was fully established. It is important to notice that the 

 temperature reached in these experiments, namely, from — 70° to — 80° 

 F. (— 56° to — 63° C), is about the minimum degree of cold hitherto 

 observed in Polar expeditions.* 



4. It is well known that freezing muscle taken from a newly- 

 killed animal, prevents the coagulation of muscle-plasma, and that 

 the plasma can, on partial thawing, be squeezed out of the muscle and 

 allowed to coagulate. It occurred to the lecturers that if muscle were 

 suddenly exposed to extreme cold, before cadaveric rigidity had set 

 in, some change might be observed in the putrefactive process. 

 Accordingly a rabbit was instantaneously killed, portions of its 

 muscles were at once placed in stoppered bottles and transferred to 

 the cold chamber, then having a temperature of about — 80° F. 

 They were kept there for ten hours ; then allowed to thaw partially 

 in the cold chamber, whilst the cold-air machine was not at work ; 

 then again frozen for twelve hours; and finally transferred to the 

 warm room. In these circumstances, they underwent rapid putrefac- 

 tion. The samples seemed to be more moist than other specimens 

 of ordinary butcher meat, and they certainly underwent more rapid 

 putrefaction. 



5. A further set of experiments with meat was carried out, in 

 which the samples were continuously exposed to a temperature of 

 from - 90° to - 120° F. ( - 83° C.) for 100 consecutive hours; the 

 bottles were then removed to the warm room, with the result that 

 in ten or twelve hours the putrefactive process seemed to be fully 

 established. 



5a. It has been shown by Pasteur | that if putrescent or ferment- 



* The lecturers have been favoured with the following remarks by Mr. 

 Alexander Buchan, the eminent meteorologist, to whom they applied for infor- 

 mation. " So far as I am aware, or can discover, the temperature of - 73*7° F. 

 registered on board the Alert in March 1876, is the lowest temperature yet 

 observed anywhere in the free atmosphere. The lowest mean monihJi) tempera- 

 ture known is — 55 8° F.for January, at Werchojansk (lat. G7° 3i' N., and long. 

 133° 51' E.), in north-eastern Siberia." It is possible that one or more of the 

 individual observations tliat make up this low mean may have given a reading 

 lower than - 73-7° F. 



t Comptes^Rendus, Ivi., 734-1189. See also article " Fermentation," Watt's 

 * Dictionary of Chemistry,' First Supplement, p. 612. 



