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TYNDALL'S EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE 219 
his experiments, ‘there is but one interpretation. 
An interpretation which violates all antecedent know- 
ledge is undeserving of the name.” This was said 
by him in one of his most caustic letters in con- 
demnation of my views and experiments, and in 
reply to my hint that there was another interpreta- 
tion of his experiments which he entirely ignored. 
It can be easily understood that a man who 
adopted this attitude, and was so overbearingly 
confident in regard to the truth of his own doctrines, » 
would not trouble himself overmuch to meet all his 
opponents’ views. In his next letter to Zhe Tzmes 
(July 24, 1877), in further condemnation of me, and 
written in his most dogmatic style, he said that when 
the discrepancy occurred between his earlier and his 
later experiments the possible influence of ‘“‘ the age 
of the hay ” suggested itself to him. He then made 
the following remarks: ‘‘ The hint was sufficient to 
cause me to seek through the country for samples 
of old hay. Lord Claud Hamilton was good enough 
to send me some from Heathfield. From Colchester 
I obtained hay five years old, and from other places 
hay in different stages of desiccation.” Then comes 
the following surprising and boastful statement, “ | 
hunted this hay-contagion down till I could place my 
finger on it, and I showed by experiments, long 
continued and laborious, the ravages it produced 
among infusions of all kinds.” 
I say this statement is a surprising one, because 
it must be remembered that at the time the actual 
“spores” of the hay-bacillus had recently become 
