Journal SXSf] S^pontaueous Generation. 259 
larly the flocculent matter, which also contains oil-globules, and which 
is generally held in suspension, and floats near the bottom of the 
infusions, to be equally abundant in vegetable organisms as those 
masses which float on the surface ; and in the case of the liver of 
the fowl, a small portion which remained entirely at the bottom of 
the vessel developed one of the largest growths that I have yet 
seen, and which I believe belongs to the genus Le^tomitus, and is 
very nearly allied to L. lacteus, but it difiers from that species in 
not being constricted at the joints. Again, on this same piece of 
liver arose a rather large inflated film, or what appeared to me a 
protoplasmic or structureless thin jelly; this never was brought 
into contact with the air at all, except when I took up a portion of 
it with a glass tube, to place it under the microscope ; and yet this 
film had embedded in it quite a network of illiptical sporules, not 
molecular bodies, but having all the appearance of sporules of some 
mucorinous plant. This, then, to me, who saw this remarkable 
structure, would prove a great stumbling-block to the acceptance of 
M. Pasteur's theory. This structure appeared on the eighth day 
after the infusion was made (Fig. 8). 
I began my experiments in this way : I prepared three glass 
vessels by thoroughly cleansing them and boiling them; I then 
dried them at the fire. I then took part of the liver of a fowl 
directly from the bird, and placed it in one of the vessels, covering 
it instantly it was taken out ; I then poured about two inches of 
boiling water into it, keeping it covered, except when the water 
was being poured in. I then took a piece of beef, of about half-an- 
ounce in weight, cut directly out of a larger piece, so that it should 
not be brought into contact with the atmosphere more than was 
possible, and placed this in the second prepared vessel, keeping this 
covered as before. I then took a saucepan half-filled with water, 
into which I placed two of the vessels, keeping them carefully 
covered all the time with stout paper covers, leaving a long curtain 
of paper reaching half-way down the vessels, so that what air got 
into the vessels must make a circuitous route. I then boiled the 
contents of the vessels for fifteen minutes, when the liver had nearly 
all become disintegrated, and the beef had begun to break down, 
and .was giving ofl" masses of flocculent matter, both making a more 
or less coloured infusion. Night having intervened between the 
boiling and the examination, but at nine o'clock the next morning 
I found each infusion tolerably clear, the colouring matter having 
become deposited at the bottom, and each infusion was covered with 
a thin pellicle, which was filled with minute points of the disin- 
tegrated liver. The molecules of the liver were, as a rule, smaller 
than those of the beef; but in the liver I observed, beside the 
molecules, some larger bluish-looking cells, about TYi-ujy^^'^ of an 
inch long ; I also observed a few in the beef (Fig. 2). The molecular 
