1877—1879 41 



tures caused septicaemia in an animal. But, while the bacillus 

 anthraeis is aerobic, the septic vibrio, being anaerobic, must be 

 cultivated in a vacuum, or in carbonic acid gas. And, cultivat- 

 ing those bacteridia and those vibriones with at least as much 

 care as a Dutchman might give to rare tulips, Pasteur succeeded 

 in parting the bacillus anthraeis and the septic vibrio when 

 they were temporarily associated. In a culture in contact with 

 air, only bacteridia developed, in a culture preserved from air ; 

 only the septic vibrio. 



What Pasteur called " the Paul Bert fact " now alone re- 

 mained to be explained ; this also was simple. The blood Paul 

 Bert had received from Chartres was of the same quality as 

 that which Jaillard and Leplat had had ; that is to say already 

 septic. If filaments of bacillus anthraeis and of septic vibriones 

 perish under compressed oxygen, such is not the case with 

 the germs, which are extremely tenacious ; they can be kept for 

 several hours at a temperature of 70° C, and even of 95° C. 

 Nothing injures them, neither lack of air, carbonic acid gas nor 

 compressed oxygen. Paul Bert, therefore, killed filamentous 

 bacteridia under the influence of high pressure ; but, as the 

 germs were none the worse, those germs revived the splenic 

 fever. Paul Bert came to Pasteur's laboratory, ascertained 

 facts and watched experiments. On June 23, 1877, he hastened 

 to the Societe de Biologie and proclaimed his mistake, acting in 

 this as a loyal Frenchman, Pasteur said. 



In spite of this testimony, and notwithstanding the admira- 

 tion conceived for Pasteur by certain medical men — notably H. 

 Gueneau de Mussy, who published in that very year (1877) a 

 paper on the theory of the contagium germ and the application 

 of that theory to the etiology of typhoid fever — the struggle 

 was being continued between Pasteur and the current medical 

 doctrines. In the long discussion which began at that time 

 in the Academie de Medecine on typhoid fever, some masters 

 of medical oratory violently attacked the germ theory, pro- 

 claiming the spontaneity of living organism. Typhoid fever, 

 they said, is engendered by ourselves within ourselves. Whilst 

 Pasteur was convinced that the day would come — and that 

 was indeed the supreme goal of his life work — when contagioi/j 

 and virulent diseases would be effaced from the preoccupations, 

 mournings and anxieties of humanity, and when the infinite- 

 simally small, known, isolated and studied, would at last be 

 vanquished, his ideas were called Utopian dream« 



4 



