OF TREATMENT IN SURGERY 55 



system of treatment ; and this was that, so far as I read Pasteur's papers, he 

 had performed it only with reference to the fermentation of a saccharine solution, 

 and I wished to make sure that it applied equally to putrefaction. The experi- 

 ment was performed in the following manner. 



Experiment in support of the Germ Theory of Putrefaction. 



On the 26th of October, just half a year ago, I introduced portions of the same 

 specimen of fresh urine into four flasks, of which these are two. [The flasks, which 

 were capable of containing about six fluid ounces each, were about one-third filled.] 

 After washing the urine from their necks, which were then wide and straight, 

 I drew out the necks by means of a spirit-lamp into tubes about a line in 

 diameter, and in three of the flasks bent these elongated and attenuated necks 

 at various acute angles, as you will see in one of the two before you. In the 

 remaining flask, the neck was cut short and left vertical in position as you see 

 it here, but its orifice was reduced to even smaller calibre than in the others. 

 Each flask was then boiled over the lamp, and the fluid maintained in a state 

 of ebullition for five minutes, the steam issuing freely from the orifice. The 

 lamp was then withdrawn, and atmospheric air was permitted to rush into the 

 flask to supply the place of the condensed steam. The flasks were then left 

 undisturbed in the same room, the ends of their necks being still open so as to 

 permit free exit and entrance of air as a consequence of the diurnal changes of 

 temperature which, of course, involved alternate expansions and condensations 

 of the contained gases. Sometimes on a cold night I have raised the tem- 

 perature of the apartment considerably, and then putting the fire out, have 

 thrown open the windows so as to occasion a depression of temperature of 

 twenty degrees, involving the entrance of about a cubic inch of fresh air into 

 the body of each flask. But, independently of any such exceptional treatment, 

 a perpetual daily interchange took place between the air inside the flasks and 

 that of the room in which they stood. And what has been the result of the 

 action of the air upon the urine ? In the flask with straight and short, though 

 narrow neck, I observed after ten days a minute filamentous object at the 

 bottom of the glass. It grew larger from day to day, and was evidentl}' a kind 

 of minute vegetation ; and on applying a pocket magnifier, it was seen to con- 

 sist of delicate branching threads. Four days after this growth first appeared, 

 I observed an object floating on the surface of the hquid, evidently also a minute 

 fungus ; but this in the course of a few davs clearlv showed itself to be of 

 a different kind, consisting of straight radiating filaments much more closely 

 packed, while to the naked eye its appearance was much denser than the other, 

 which was beautifully feathery and delicate, and its colour bluish-grey instead 



