438 THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



to ascertain what amount of evidence was obtain- 

 able as to the possibility of living matter being pro- 

 duced de novo, from changes taking place, in the main, 

 amongst inorganic or mineral elements, I made during 

 the present and the past year many experiments, some 

 of which I will now detail. With the exception of Prof. 

 Mantegazza's one experiment, and of one by Prof. 

 Wyman, all the flasks in my experiments have been 

 raised to temperatures higher than any which had pre- 

 viously been resorted to. 



In those which have been productive, the hermetically 

 closed flasks have been exposed to temperatures ranging 

 from 27o-3o7F (i32-i53C), though in other un- 

 productive experiments the flasks have been heated to 

 327F and 464 F. As on other occasions, the solu- 

 tions were heated in <vacuo, so that the experiments 

 also differed in this respect from those of Mantegazza, 

 Wyman, and Cantoni, who adhered to the method 

 pursued by Spallanzani and Needham. 



In some of my earlier experiments, I had the benefit 

 of Prof. Frank] and's assistance, though subsequently he 

 kindly placed his digester at my disposal 1 . 



The mode of preparation of the flasks and the instru- 

 ment employed for heating them were thus described 

 by Prof. Frankland : 



1 Of the Experiments now about to be recorded, those in which the 

 flasks were heated under Dr. Frankland's superintendence are Nos. g, 

 b>j, k> s > u i w t and.y, whilst those which were executed alone by me in 

 University College are Nos. a, b, c, d, e, f t I, m, , o, p, q, r, t, v, x* 

 and z. 



