190 O'Brien. — The Proteids of Wheat . 
which I used yielded about io°/ o of crude gluten as dried 
in bulk at ioo° C., when treated according to the above 
method of washing. I found however that with a little care, 
even under what are usually described as unfavourable cir- 
cumstances, I could obtain the same amount from it, as the 
following experiments indicate. 
(i) Flour was sifted carefully through muslin into a 
beaker of water ; the intention being to dissolve as much as 
possible of whatever proteid in it was soluble in water. 
Gluten, however, seemed to form instantaneously ; as when 
the starch had sunk to the bottom, a drop of the supernatant 
fluid showed strands of gluten under the microscope. This 
could be collected by filtering : and the whole mass, having been 
left on the filter during the night, yielded, on washing out the 
starch in the usual way, -516 gram gluten from 5 grams flour 
(10*32°/,). Hence it follows that ( a ) water removes nothing 
essential to the formation of gluten ; and ( b ) if a ferment is 
present it must be ubiquitous. 
0 ) Similarly, to 10 grams of flour saturated salt-solution 
(NaCl) was added ; a stiff non-tenacious paste was the result, 
indicating that gluten had not been formed. On further 
addition of salt-solution some proteid was extracted (Vitellin, 
•0819 gram = *8x9°/). Water was then added so as to 
produce a dilute salt-solution (about io°/ o NaCl), and now 
gluten was recognisable in the liquid ; this was collected as 
before, and a total of 1*113 grs. was ultimately obtained 
(Gluten = ii*I 3°/ o ). Myosin (-019 gr., = *19%) was obtained 
from the dilute salt-extract, by coagulation. Hence the 
formation of gluten from a globulin in the flour is precluded ; 
for, under these circumstances specially favourable to its 
collection, only the normal amount (1-009°/) was obtained. 
(3) The fact that gluten was obtained in the usual quantity 
by forming the paste and conducting the earlier stages of 
washing entirely with a io°/ o salt-solution, further proves its 
independence of globulin : — 10 grams flour yielded 1*075 gram 
gluten, i. e. 10-75%. 
(4) Whilst Weyl and Bischoff 28 found that heating flour at 
