182 "DISEASES" OF BEER, 



previously. In the attacks which Duclaux and his associates 

 have directed against me, they thus always start with the 

 assumption that Pasteur had found the true solution. 



About this time a new impulse was given to bacteriology 

 in Germany by the investigations of Robert Koch, and 

 numerous pupils quickly gathered around this famous investi- 

 gator. The problems attacked by this school were, in the 

 main, such as have a direct importance in medicine, and it 

 was only exceptionally that investigations were published 

 relating to the physiology of fermentation ; prominent 

 amongst the latter are Hueppe's studies on the lactic acid 

 bacteria. Neither Koch nor his pupils devoted any attention 

 to the alcoholic ferments, and, where they make any reference 

 to these, it is only in a very cursory manner. The cause of 

 this is easy to understand, as these fungi have little or no 

 interest for the pathologist and hygiest. 



Some years earlier Fitz had commenced his valuable 

 investigation on various species of bacteria, and their fer- 

 mentation-products. These researches have as little to do 

 with the diseases of fermented liquors as Hueppe's, yet, 

 indirectly, they throw some light on this question. 



In the year 1884, Thausing* expressed himself as follows: 

 " Science has furnished valuable results in connection with 

 the organisms of fermentation and fermentation itself, but for 

 the brewer it has yielded practically no result of direct 

 application, and now, as ever, the process of fermentation is 

 shrouded in a deep mystery. Hansen's investigations on the 

 cultivation of pure yeast certainly justify great hopes ; if they 

 do not deceive, we are on the threshold of an achievement, 

 the importance of which cannot be over-estimated. For the 

 present we have still to deal with the conditions which now 

 prevail." 



* Julius Thausing, ' Einfluss der Hefegabe auf Hauptgarung, Hefe und Bier.' 

 In the ' 14 Jabresberichte der ersten osterr. Brauerschule in Modling.' Also in 

 the 'Allgem. Zeitschr. f. Bierbrauerei,' Vienna, 1884, p. 872. 



