1870.] with Recent Experiments, 495 



guarded myself from considering this as more than prima facie 

 evidence. Another circumstance tended to show the correctness of 

 this observation. 



I had just found the notes of my experiments with infusions in 

 1863; and these entries had been made hi connection with the 

 infusion of orange-juice : — 



" Aug. 3. Mycelium with minute cells." 

 " Like yeast-cells, ' Micr. Diet./ Plate 20, Fig. 23." 

 " Aug. 7. The flocculent deposit tastes like mould." " No acid 

 taste." 



This description and the sketches which accompany it leave me 

 in no doubt that tbe appearances were precisely those which I had 

 observed last month, and the Plate and Fig. referred to in the 

 ' Micrographic Dictionary ' are strangely enough the same as I had 

 a second time consulted after an interval of seven years, and which 

 will be found copied in an article recently published by me on the 

 manufacture of Beer.* 



The same notes contained the following entries : — 



1. In regard to an infusion of cabbage-juice exposed July 27th, 

 and examined August 2nd — 



" Homogeneous cellules. — Little or no motion, and nothing to 

 indicate whether they were spontaneously produced from cabbage. 

 Closely resembled sessile monads in dust exposed under coloured 

 glasses. See paper before Academy " (des Sciences). 



2. Concerning pure distilled water exposed August 2nd, 1863, 

 examined 7th (temperature 70°) — 



"A little mycelium, same as in organic matters" 

 The only difficulty I experienced was this. It seemed to me 

 incredible that the same specific germs which (as I believed) had 

 floated in the atmosphere in 1863, and had then found their way 

 into and had become developed in infusions of orange and cabbage 

 juice as well as in distilled water, should again be present in an 

 infusion of orange-juice and in distilled water in 1870, but a further 

 investigation soon decided the matter. 



On the 22nd of August last, again, after continued warm dry 

 weather, the rain set in, and during the first hour I succeeded in catch- 

 ing some direct from the clouds in two distinct localities : at my 

 own house, which is in Everton, at the very outskirts of Liverpool, 

 with gardens about, and trees and fields close at hand; and also in 

 Vauxhall Eoad, one of the most unhealthy of the lower parts of tbe 

 town, where, notwithstanding the efforts of the sanitary authorities, 

 the atmosphere is charged with smoke and other emanations from 

 factory chimneys. 



* " Buer : " see ' Journal of Science,' July, 1870. 



