Page 91 - Ethel D. Hume - Bešam ili Paster: Izgubljeno poglavlje u istoriji biologije

88 BfiGHAMP OR PASTEUR?
fibres and other anatomical elements of the body, and in
great abundance in tuberculous substances and other
disease matters.
Bechamp, always so careful to avoid unsubstantiated
conclusions, did not allow his imagination to run away in
regard to them. He at first merely noted them and
bestowed upon them the noncommittal name of "little
bodies." He had no further enlightenment in regard to
them at the time when his new duties took him to Mont-
pellier and he there brought to a close the observations
that he had commenced at Strasbourg and which he
recounted and explained in his Memoir of 1857.
It will be remembered that for many of these experi-
ments, the Professor employed various salts, including
potassium carbonate, in the presence ofwhich the inversion
of cane-sugar did not take place, in spite of the absence of
creosote. Another experiment that he made was to sub-
stitute for potassium carbonate, calcium carbonate in the
form of chalk. Great was his surprise to find that in spite
of the addition of creosote, to prevent the intrusion of
atmospheric germs, cane-sugar none the less underwent
inversion, or change of some sort. In regard to creosote,
Bechamp had already proved that though it was a pre-
ventive against the invasion of extraneous organisms, it
had no effect in hampering the development of moulds
that were already established in the medium. The experi-
ments in which he had included chalk seemed, however,
to contradict this conclusion, for in these cases, creosote
proved incapable of preventing the inversion of sugar. He
could only believe that the contradiction arose from some
faultiness of procedure; so he determined to probe further
into the mystery and meanwhile to omit from his Memoir
any reference to the experiments in which chalk had
proved a disturbing factor.
The work that Professor Bechamp undertook in this
connection is an object lesson in painstaking research. To
begin with, he had, first, chalk and, afterwards, a block of
limestone conveyed to his laboratory with great precau-