264 THE BEE-KEEPER’S MANUAL. 
experiments, which occupy three long articles and 
a speech in the Bienen-Zeitung of 1874. The follow- 
ing summary must therefore suffice. His object was 
to prove to demonstration the truth of the theory of 
Dr. Preuss, that the micrococcus fungus in the foul 
larve and cells—not that in the stomach of bees— 
was the essential accompaniment of foul brood; 
and especially that the conveyance of these threads 
in the air was the means by which, when once en- 
gendered, the epidemic was propagated and spread. 
This theory having been assailed by Von Berlepsch, 
as well as by others of less note, the Pastor’s experi- 
ments were so devised as to be absolutely incapable 
of refutation, anl they showed with marvellous uni- 
formity that the micrococcus spores were really wafted 
about as he had surmised (in a special degree they 
would be set afloat by the wings of the fanners), 
and that by catching them upon pieces of wool, 
he could produce foul brood at his will in any larve 
to which these were applied. He tried it first with 
the blow-fly, and afterwards with the insects more 
immediately concerned, and in both instances his 
efforts were crowned with the most striking demon- 
stration that his reasoning was true. 
A question naturally presents itself as to what is 
the relation between the bacteria and the micrococci, 
but this we are as yet hardly in a position to 
answer with certainty. The latter, however, appear 
to establish their presence first, and hence the con- 
clusion of Schénfeld seems strongly supported, that 
they are germinating spores—the seeds, in fact, com- 
parable to thistle-lown—from which the bacteria fungi 
