8PONTANKOU8 OK.\ '>N. 



months the pure mineral solution and the pure turnip 

 n side by side, I dron into each of them a 



itory dust. The effect here is tardier than 

 when the speck of putrid liquid was er In three 



days, however, after its infection with t) ;tu> turnip 



infusion is muddy, and swarming as before with bacteria. 

 But what abut the mineral solution which, in 

 experiment, behaved in a manner undistinguishable from 

 i nip-juice? At the end of three days there is not a 

 bacterium to he found in it. At the end <f three weeks it 

 is Anally innocent of bacterial life. V, repeat the 



experiment with the solution and the infusion a hundred 

 times with the same invariable result. Always in the case 

 of the latter the sowing of the atmospheric dust yields a 

 crop of bacteria never in the former does the dry germinal 

 matter kindle into active life.* What is the inference 

 which the reflecting mind must draw from this experi- 

 : Is it not as clear as day that while both liquids are 

 f<-"d the bacteria and to enable them to increase 

 and multiply, affrr they / ' fully developed, 



only one of the liquids is able to develop into active 



eria the germinal dust of the air? 



1 invite my friend to reflect upon this conclusion; lie 

 will, I think, see that there id no escape from it. He may, 

 if he prefers, hold the opinion, which I consider err. .neons, 

 that bacteria exist in the air, not as <:* nn but as desiccated 

 . The inference remain-, (hat while the one 

 liquid is able to force the passage from the inactive to the 

 active state, the other is not. 



thU is not at all the inference which has been drawn 



from experiments with the mineral solution. Seeing its 



ability to nourish bacteria when once inoculated with the 



n, and observing that no bacteria 



.red in the solution after long exposure to the air. the 



was drawn that ncif/i, r fa 



existed in the air. Through . the ablest 



literature of the subject, oven that opposed to heterogeny, 

 is infected with this error; while heterogenists at home 



This is tl,,. ,|,.,,,,rtMM-i,t ,,f th- BhMld Ntetiai d ..... Vfttd l.y 

 other-. 'TimeoUt would lead me to 1017 that il,.- .! 



bacteria, though exceedingly alow aiu) <!><; 



