SPONTANEOUS GENERATION 333 



peratures with which both of us had previously worked. 

 Waiving all protest against the caprice thus manifested, 

 I met this new requirement also. The sealed tubes, which 

 had proved barren in the Royal Institution, were sus- 

 pended in perforated boxes, and placed under the super- 

 vision of an intelligent assistant in the Turkish Bath in 

 Jermyn Street. From two to six days had been allowed 

 for the generation of organisms in hermetically sealed 

 tubes. Mine remained in the washing-room of the bath 

 for nine days. Thermometers placed in the boxes, and 

 read off twice or three times a day, showed the tempera- 

 ture to vary from a minimum of 101 to a maximum of 

 112 Fahr. At the end of nine days the infusions were 

 as clear as at the beginning. They were then removed 

 to a warmer position. A temperature of 115 had been 

 mentioned as particularly favorable to spontaneous genera- 

 tion. For fourteen days the temperature of the Turkish 

 Bath hovered about this point, falling once as low as 106, 

 reaching 116 on three occasions, 118 on one, and 119 

 on two. The result was quite the same as that just re- 

 corded. The higher temperatures proved perfectly incom- 

 petent to develop life. 



Taking the actual experiment we have made as a basis 

 of calculation, if our 940 flasks were opened on the hay- 

 loft of the Bel Alp, 858 of them would become filled with 

 organisms. The escape of the remaining 82 strengthens 

 our case, proving as it does conclusively that not in the 

 air, nor in the infusions, nor in anything continuous dif- 

 fused through the air, but in discrete particles, suspended 

 in the air and nourished by the infusions, we are to seek 

 the cause of life. Our experiment proves these particles 

 to be in some cases so far apart on the hayloft as to per- 



