The Nineteenth Century 227 



such is not the case in the Noctilucae which he studied so thoroughly. 

 In Noctiluca, Quatrefages believed he had shown that the lumines- 

 cence was not a combustion and came to the conclusion that the 

 light emission was independent of all material secretion and due 

 to " contraction of the interior mass of the body," the rapid scintil- 

 lations being the result of " rupture and rapid contraction of the 

 filaments of the interior and that the fixed light which these animals 

 emit before dying, proceeds from the permanent contraction of the 

 contractile tissues adhering to the inner surface of the general 

 envelope." 



The idea that light emission was connected with muscle contrac- 

 tion may possibly have originated with Macartney (1810) ; it was 

 expressed by a surprising number of later students of biolumines- 

 cence. The connection is undoubtedly due to the fact that stimula- 

 tion of a luminous animal results both in light production and in 

 muscle contraction. The two processes have no more in common 

 than that they are both responses to stimulation. 



Quatrefages was reluctant to express an opinion on the cause of 

 the light of dead animals or of rotten wood. In fact no one had 

 ventured to state categorically that the light was due to bacteria and 

 fungi, although from time to time suggestions had been made that 

 " animalculae " were responsible. 



Actual proof that the light of rotten wood and shining meat came 

 from a " Pilz " is due to Johann Florian Heller (1813-1871) , a pro- 

 fessor in the General Hospital, decent, and later a professor at the 

 University of Vienna; he named the organisms. His paper, " Ueber 

 das Leuchten im Pflanzen und Tierreiche," appeared in 1853. It 

 was a serial of six intallments, totalling seventy pages, in the Archiv 

 fiir physiologische und pathologische Chemie unci Microscopic. The 

 choice of this journal is evidence of the well-established chemical 

 approach to luminescence problems. Heller's work actually dealt 

 with all aspects of bioluminescence, but is best known for his cate- 

 gorical statement that the light of decaying wood was due to a 

 fungus, called " Rhizomorpha noctiluca," and the light of shining 

 fish and meat to a bacillus, " Sarcina noctiluca." 



Despite his preoccupation with luminescences due to bacteria and 

 fungi. Heller thought that the spontaneous light of living animals 

 might result from a special secreted substance, in such forms as 

 Lampyris, Scolopendra, or Medusa, and attributed the light of the 

 sea to myriads of microscopic plants as well as to animals. He sug- 

 gested that Rhizomorpha and Sarcina light might be useful in gun- 

 powder mills or magazines or in coal mines, where a weak con- 

 tinuous, heatless light is desirable. The discovery was fundamental 



