STUDIES ON FERMENTATION. 261 



their life and action are of prolonged duration. We must 

 have recourse to special experimental apparatus to enable 

 us to demonstrate the mode of life of alcoholic ferments 

 under the influence of free oxygen ; it is their state of existence 

 apart from air, in the depths of liquids that attracts all 

 our attention. The results of their action are, however, 

 marvellous, if we regard the products resulting from them, 

 in the important industries of which they are the life and 

 soul. In the case of ordinary moulds, the opposite holds good. 

 What we want to use special experimental apparatus for with 

 them is to enable us to demonstrate the possibility of their 

 continuing to live for a time out of contact with air, and all 

 our attention, in their case, is attracted by the facility with 

 which they develop under the influence of oxygen. Thus the 

 decomposition of saccharine liquids, which is the consequence 

 of the life of fungi without air, is scarcely perceptible, and so 

 is of no practical importance. Their aerial life, on the other 

 hand, in which they respire and accomplish their process 

 of oxidation under the influence of free oxygen, is a normal 

 phenomenon, and one of prolonged duration which cannot fail 

 to strike the least thoughtful of observers. We are convinced 

 that a day will come when moulds will be utilized in certain 

 industrial operations, on account of their power of destroying 

 organic matter. The conversion of alcohol into vinegar in the 

 process of acetification, and the production of gallic acid by the 

 action of fungi on wet gall-nuts, are already connected with 

 this kind of phenomena.* On this last subject, the important 



* We shall show, some day, that the processes of oxidation due to 

 growth of fungi cause, in certain decompositions, liberation of ammonia 

 to a considerable extent, and that by regulating their action we might 

 cause them to extract the nitrogen from a host of organic debris, as also, 

 by checking the production of such organisms, we might considerably 

 increase the proportion of nitrates in the artificial nitrogenous substances. 

 By cultivating various moulds on the surface of damp bread in a current 

 of air, we have obtained an abundance of ammonia, derived from the 

 decomposition of the albuminoids eflPected by the fungoid life. The decom- 

 position of asparagus, and several other animal or vegetable substances, 

 has given similar results. 



