244 PASTEUK: THE HISTORY OF A MIND 



infection revealed infection through the food, and 

 actually demonstrated that the small animals of the 

 laboratory could contract anthrax when the anthrax 

 bacilli or the spores were mixed with their food. For 

 want of resources he could not make the same experi- 

 ments on the large domestic animals, and regarding 

 them he left the question an open one. He also left 

 undecided the problem of infection by respiration and 

 through the lungs. But science had nevertheless made 

 a great stride when, with the discovery of the spore 

 and its power of resistance, there disappeared one of the 

 great objections which the etiological conception of 

 Davaine had raised. 



Nevertheless, the victory still remained indecisive, 

 for a new adversary had arisen. To the affirmation 

 of Koch, P. Bert had replied in 1887 by an experiment 

 in which by exposing anthrax blood to the action of 

 compressed oxygen, he killed or at least believed he 

 killed the bacteridia. Inoculation of this blood thus 

 robbed of the parasite produced the disease and death, 

 without the reappearance of the bacteridia. Therefore, 

 he concluded, the bacteridia are neither the cause nor 

 the necessary effect of the anthrax disease. It was 

 reverting, with new arguments, to the idea of Brauell 

 which we discussed in the beginning of this short history. 



VI 



OBJECTIONS TO THE NEW DOCTRINE 



From what standpoint could a man, as unfamiliar 

 with this class of studies as Pasteur, regard the facts 

 which precede, studying them with his characteristic 

 vigor? From what standpoint also ought the medical 



