i, SEMINAL VERMICULI, gr 
immediate death of vermiculi in capillary tubes 
during fummer. Having filled fimilar tubes with 
recent femen, and fealed them hermetically, I ex- 
pofed fome to the heat of the atmofphere at about 
63°, and others to the heat of the human body, 
keeping them in the axilla in a large glafs tube. 
In a ftate of health, my own heat is about 97°. 
The vermiculi expofed to the heat of the atmo- 
fphere lived two days and a half; fome even 
three ; but thofe experiencing the heat of my 
body fupported it only thirteen hours. Their 
more immediate death cannot be afcribed to the 
greater degree of heat, fince it is about the fame 
as what preferves them alive, or in which they 
generally live: Nor can we afcribe it to any other 
noxious principle arifing from the nature of the 
tubes, fince they were perfectly fimilar to thofe 
expofed to the atmofpheric temperature. It 
therefore becomes neceflary to recur to fome al- 
teration or noxious quality contracted by the fe- 
men, which makes heat accelerate their death : 
and I acknowledge, that I cannot find this altera- 
tion or injurious quality but in the principle of 
putrefaction, which is manifefted by the foetor 
on breaking the tubes: certainly it is this that 
muft be fatal to the vermiculi, as I fhall demon. 
{trate in Chapter 6. The putrefying principle 
does not commence in the femen expofed to 
the open air only feven or eight hours in fummer. 
On 
