Report of Society's Meetings. 135 
sample XIV "Plenty of large groups of cocci," and the 
micro-organisms appear to have been equally plentiful 
in samples V and VI, In these cases the *' cinder path " 
appears to have been fairly fertile ! 
Remarks are next made with regard to our having 
added 10 per cent, of faulty rum to sound rums, and it is 
assumed that we did so in order to at once produce 
faultiness. This is not the case. Reference to our 
paper (p. 4 of Timehri^ vol. XII, part I, and p. 412 of the 
Sugar Cane') shows that this proportion of faulty spirit 
was added in unsuccessful attempts to inoculate sound 
rums with the organism, and ample time — weeks in fact 
— was allowed for development. 
Later, on the same page, they state " that Messrs. 
Harrison, Scard and Daniels performed similar experi- 
ments with the same negative results, and arrived at the 
hasty conclusion that the organism was dead." The 
conclusion we arrived at, not hastily, but after full con- 
sideration, was " that the rums from which the sediments 
had been obtained were free from the spores of the 
organism, or else that the organism and any of its spores 
which might have been present in the original rum were 
dead. This is a very different view from that stated in 
the monograph. 
Mr. and Mrs. Veley next indulge themselves in an 
attempt to vilify that portion of our work which con- 
firmed theirs, thus clearly indicating the animus which 
moved them whilst writing this portion of their book. 
They assume that we neglected the precautions which 
even the veriest tyro in this class of work observes. 
This is not a fact, every vessel used by us, in attempting 
to inoculate sound rum so as to render it faulty, was 
sterilised, even the " stoppered bottles," and the latter, 
which were of the best quality, were, after introdu6lion of 
the sterilised stoppers, prote6led from any accidental 
contamination by a layer of vaseline rubbed over the 
jun6lion between the neck of the bottle and the upper 
part of the stopper. But the introdu6lion of this assump- 
tion by Mr. and Mrs. Veley is entirely beside the ques- 
tion ; the experiments were being carried on with a liquid 
which is, as far as our present knowledge goes, anti- 
