684 THE UNIVERSE. 



Again, botanists are acquainted with a peculiar plant, the 

 Racodium cellare, which has never been found except on 

 the casks in our cellars. Where did the germs dwell before 

 these were invented, during the long ages when our fore- 

 fathers only employed amphorae ? 



Berard, a physiologist of the faculty of medicine, even 

 speaks of a plant which only lives on the drops of tallow 

 which the miners in working let fall upon the soil. Were 

 the seeds of this singular species produced, then, at creation, 



9 



252. Spontaneously formed Microscopic Grains which are found in Fermentations : 

 Cryptococcus cerevisias (Auct.)- 



in anticipation that mines would be worked by the aid of 

 our common means of lighting ? 



Lastly, do not all botanists know that every sick or dy- 

 ing plant is certain to be attacked by its special parasite ? 

 There is no explaining the introduction of the seedlets of 

 this fatal guest, and we may say that there are as many 

 varieties as there are species of plants. Who, then, could 

 dare to maintain that the air suffices to furnish so many 

 destructive germs ? 



Reason revolts before so daring a supposition. In fact, if 

 panspermism were anything but a fiction, the atmosphere 

 ought to be so obstructed with eggs and seeds that all 

 movement and respiration would become impossible, and we 

 should perish by suffocation. 



Microscopy has by one single word forever overturned 



