


1891.] Botany. IOII 
This is the conclusion to which two investigators have recently 
arrived as a result of their experiments.’ These two, though differing 
T in methods, arrived at practically the same conclusions, —viz., 
- Ozone will attack milk, and produce lactic acid by a process of 
irec oxidation; 2. During a thunder storm sufficient ozone is 
generated by the electrical discharges to exert this oxidizing action 
on milk. 
The method of both these experimenters, in brief, was to expose milk 
`“ to the action of ozone generated by a spark of electricity passing through 
oxygen. This was done in a closed vessel, partly filled with milk, and the 
air above the milk displaced by oxygen ; ozone could then be generated 
by passing a spark across through the oxygen. According to both 
observers, a spark passed in this way from fifteen to twenty minutes 
would generate enough ozone to coagulate the milk in less than an 
hour. According to Prof. Tolomei, this action is even more rapid if, 
instead of a spark, a ‘silent discharge’’ of electricity from the two 
poles of the battery be employed. This is due simply to the fact that 
a larger amount of ozone can be generated from a given quantity of 
oxygen by the ‘silent discharge ” than by a spark. 
These results differ considerably from some obtained in this labora- 
tory some time ago. Sin`c the publication of Tolomei’s work ours 
has been repeated, and gives exactly the same results as were obtained 
before, 
Our methods were similar to those described above. A Wolff bottle 
was taken and filled with milk and oxygen. Wires connected with a 
Holtz induction machine were then passed in at the opposite necks of 
the bottle, and ozone generated by passing electricity, either as a 
spark or in the form of a silent discharge, across through the oxygen. 
A second bottle was partly filled with milk and kept as a control. 
Although repeated over and over, under various conditions of 
temperature, and with milk of various degrees of sweetness, from that 
just from the cow to that a day or more old, in no case were we able 
to produce any such rapid souring as was described by Iles and 
Tolomei. We did, however, get a slight hastening of the time of 
souring. If the control coagulated in thirty-six hours, that experi- 
mented on would coagulate only an hour or two earlier. Moreover, 
we found that free oxygen alone was sufficient to produce this nee 
hastening. 
3 D. W. iles, Chemical News, Vol. 36, p. 237, 1877. Prof, Tolomei, Biedermann's 
Centralblatt für Agriculturchemie, 1890, P. $38. | f 



