oo ee: 

OTHER NEW EXPERIMENTS 179 
that I imported germs into the experimental fluids 
in the boiled liquor potassze, and adopted the view 
that the germs on the walls of a flask were not 
really killed by contact with boiling acid fluids, so 
that I (in my capacity of physician) had succeeded 
in restoring animation to germs which he and all 
other experimenters had hitherto believed to have 
been hopelessly killed—all because they had pre- 
viously never taken the precaution to /flamdé the 
vessels made use of in their experiments.! He, 
in fact, then said explicitly that the germs on the 
walls of the vessel had not actually been killed in 
the boiled acid fluids, ‘hough thezr powers of multiplr- 
cation had been destroyed. This view was subse- 
quently set forth at length by Pasteur’s former 
assistant, Ch. Chamberland (now sub-director of 
the Pasteur Institute), in a Thesis which he pre- 
sented in 1879 for his degree of Doctor of Science. 
Speaking of boiled acid fluids, he says (4oc. czt. p. 
89), ‘‘ Mais ils ne sont pas stériles au vrai sens du mot, 
1 The method now employed for this purpose was attained by 
placing the vessels, plugged with cotton wool, in a gas-oven for a 
time, at a temperature of 150°-200° C.—that is, till the cotton wool 
showed a faint brown tinge. That this had not previously been 
deemed necessary is shown by what Chamberland, Pasteur’s assistant 
at the time, said in his Thesis (/oc. cz¢. 1879, p. 21). Speaking of some 
experiments made about 1876, he says: ‘‘ Au moment ou j’ai fait ces 
expériences, je pensait qu’il suffirait de faire bouillir de eau pendant 
quelques minutes dans un appareil pour le priver complétement de 
germes ; mais j’ai découvert depuis, comme je le montrerai plus loin, 
qu’il existe certains organismes dont les germes ou spores peuvent 
resister pendant plus d’un heure a la température de l’eau bouillante.” 
It was after this that he and M. Pasteur introduced the new procedure, 
and insisted upon the necessity that vessels used in such experiments 
should be “ /lambés.” 
