NOTES AND MEMORANDA. 167 



central portions of stone-fruits, such as plums and peaches, 

 whilst the surrounding and external fleshy portions are quite 

 uninjured and unaffected. Speaking of Botrytis infe&tans, 

 which he regards as ' the proximate cause of the potato 

 murrain,' the Rev. M. J. Berkeley says (' Introd. to Crypto- 

 gamic Botany,' 1857, p. 65) : ' The walls of the cavities 

 of the carpels of tomatoes are often covered with fungus, 

 though there is no communication with the outward air ; 

 and a crop of the mould has been seen to grow in a few 

 hours from the cut surface of a diseased potato even though 

 the foliage itself had exhibited no trace of the parasite.' 

 Multitudes of such facts might be referred to, but the facts 

 themselves are, I believe, admitted by all. Dr. Lionel Beale, 

 for instance, says, ' Lowly vegetable germs appear in closed 

 cavities in the substance of dead animal and vegetable tissues. 

 I have often seen them within vegetable cells in which not a 

 pore could be discovered when the tissue was examined by 

 the highest powers.' And again he says, ' I have detected 

 them in the interior of the cells of animals, and in the very 

 centre of cells with walls so thick and strong that it seems 

 almost impossible that such soft bodies could have made their 

 way through from the surrounding medium.' 



" Nothing is easier for us than to discover such organisms 

 within the very centre of the oi-gans of dead animals when- 

 ever the parts begin to exhibit signs of putrefaction. They 

 may easily be met with in the centre of a mass of brain- 

 tissue, for instance ; and M. Bechamp (' Compt. Rend.,' t. 

 Ixvi) has also observed that most active Bacteria in great 

 abundance are always to be found in the midst of a portion 

 of liver which has been allowed to macerate in water for a 

 day or two. When a section is made through such a mass, 

 the cells in the very centi'al portions are found to be swarm- 

 ing with moving particles and distinct Bacteria, thougli 

 none or very few are to be found in the water in whicli the 

 portion of liver is immersed. M. Estor has, moreover, 

 found that the cells of the liver in dogs, rabbits, mice, and 

 various kinds of birds, even immediately after death, always 

 contain a number of actively moving particles or mere 

 granules {microzymoi), which, according to MM. Estor and 

 Bechamp, have the power of developing into definitely formed 

 Bacteria. 



I fully believe (with other observers) that after death, or 

 when death is close at hand, such particles may undergo an 

 internal change fitting them for independent life just as milk- 

 globules are able to individualise themselves, and grow into 

 embryo Penicillia. The union of two, three, or more of such 



