Pasteur's Experimental Study of Microbes.
The same difficulty arises with Pasteur as with Darwin; his life-work has already been described often and well. Readers unversed in science have only to turn to the Vie de Pasteur, written by his son-in-law, Vallery-Radot, to find a luminous account, giving just so much detail as makes the discoveries intelligible and interesting. If shorter sketches are demanded, they exist. We must therefore above all things be brief, and content ourselves with reminding the reader of facts which, in spite of their recent date, are as well known as anything in the history of science.
Chemists will claim Pasteur as one of their number, and we do not dispute the claim. Trained in experimental methods by the chemical laboratory, he devoted his best powers to the study of living things, and, without ceasing to be a chemist, became one of the greatest of biologists.
Pasteur's chief work was of course the experimental investigation of living particles which float in the air—what we may call live dust. Before his day such particles had been seen, named, and classified; some few had been studied in their action and effects. Most of them are plants of low grade, simplified to the last point for the sake of minuteness, on which their ready dispersal depends.
Yeast.—Van Helmont, early in the seventeenth century, when the microscope had not yet become an instrument of research, attempted to investigate the fermentation of beer, and made acquaintance with the properties of the gas which is evolved, his gas silvestre, which was afterwards called fixed air, or carbonic acid. Leeuwenhoek about 1680 examined yeast by his microscopes, and discovered that it is made up of globules which often cohere, and that these globules give off bubbles of gas. Then comes a long interval, during which nothing was done to elucidate the process of fermentation. It was not till 1837 that Caignard-Latour and Schwann, independently of each other, showed that yeast-globules multiply by budding, and are therefore to be set down as living things, probably plants of a simple kind. Twenty years more passed without sensible progress; during this time chemists were striving to prove that the alcohol was produced by contact-action, and that the globules were of no practical importance. By the year 1860 Pasteur was engaged upon the problem. It is well known that he arrived at a firm conviction that living yeast-cells are essential to the production of alcohol. It has since been discovered that the enzyme (unorganised ferment of older writers) secreted by living yeast-cells can change sugar into alcohol after the cells themselves have been destroyed, and that other plants besides yeast-cells secrete the same enzyme when deprived of oxygen.
Bacteria.—Another and even more important chapter in the history of air-wafted organisms was opened by the indefatigable Leeuwenhoek. In 1683 he wrote a letter to the Royal Society which makes mention for the first time of bacteria, which he found upon his own teeth, and described as minute rods; some of them moved with surprising agility. For nearly two hundred years little more was done. A few bacteria were named and classified, and there the matter rested until Schwann proved experimentally that putrefaction is just as much the work of living microscopic organisms as alcoholic fermentation. In 1857 and the following years Pasteur not only confirmed the work of Schwann, which had been received by the majority of chemists with distrust, but went on to show that the lactic, butyric, and ammoniacal fermentations also depend upon the activity of bacteria. The happy thought struck him that they might be studied alive—a possibility which he soon realised in practice, and upon which the new science of bacteriology largely rests. From about the year 1873 he began to occupy himself seriously with contagion, which he suspected to be connected with specific aerial germs. Davaine and others had years before observed in the blood of sheep and cattle which had died of "charbon" (anthrax) minute "bâtonnets" (bacilli). Pasteur's published results induced Davaine to ask whether his "bâtonnets" might not be the cause of "charbon." Again, it was Pasteur's results which induced Lister to make experiments in the field of antiseptic surgery. Pasteur wasted no time upon the curiosities of bacterial life. His first studies on fermentation suggested that specific diseases may be propagated by microscopic germs, and that such cases of spontaneous generation as had hitherto escaped refutation might be explained by the access of live dust. The identification and biological history of the organisms interested him only as a step towards sure methods of controlling, and, if necessary, destroying, them; of mitigating their virulence by inoculation; of rendering animals immune against them; or of stamping out the disease by isolation. All this is happily too well known for repetition here. The story, with its many dramatic incidents, can be read in the pages of Vallery-Radot.
Hardly less important than the bacteria which destroy life or endanger the products of human industry are the beneficent forms, some of which have in all ages co-operated with man, while others can only be employed by those who possess knowledge and skill. None are so important to our welfare as the bacteria which renew the fertility of the soil. But for the soil-bacteria farm-yard manure would be useless to the crop, for it is they which render it fit for assimilation. Now the bacteria of the soil have their natural enemies, the most mischievous being certain Protozoa, such as Amœba and its kindred. As soon as this fact was grasped, likely remedies were thought of; indeed, one remedy was suggested without any guidance from theory by a vine-grower of Alsace, who treated his soil with carbon disulphide to destroy phylloxera, and found that in so doing he had notably enhanced its fertility. Heating to the temperature of boiling water destroys the soil-protozoa and at the same time the bulk of the soil-bacteria. The bacteria, however, soon multiply more than ever by reason of the absence of their enemies, and a soil cleared of protozoa yields for a few years appreciably richer crops. Of other useful bacteria the briefest notice must suffice. Wine, beer, cheese, and tobacco owe to certain of them distinct flavours, for which the customer is willing to pay high. Leather in certain stages of manufacture, indigo, and woad require the access of other forms. If we also bear in mind the part which yeast plays in the every-day manufacture of bread, wine, and beer, and the part which the vinegar-mould plays in the manufacture of acetic acid, we shall get some notion of the industrial importance of the various micro-organisms. Not a little of the control which we exercise over them we owe directly or indirectly to Pasteur.
The career of Pasteur exhibits a striking unity. His first research, which dealt with a subject so remote from the ordinary studies of the biologist as the crystalline forms of tartrates, made him acquainted with activities, hitherto unsuspected, of minute forms of life. The hope of aiding the industries of Lille, Orleans, and France kept him long engaged upon ferments. If he turned aside to examine the superstition of spontaneous generation, it was to protect his methods from misconstruction. An apparent break in his programme of work was forced upon him by the silkworm pestilence. It proved to be no real break, for pébrine and flacherie were both bacterial diseases. At a comparatively early date (1863) he wrote that his chief ambition was to throw light on the spread of contagious diseases; he could not then foresee that he was destined, not only to elucidate, but in a measure to control them. Around his tomb are inscribed words, each of which commemorates a signal service to his fellow-men: "1848, Molecular dissymetry. 1857, Fermentations. 1862, Spontaneous generation. 1863, Studies of wine. 1865, Silkworm diseases. 1871, Studies on beer. 1877, Contagious diseases of animals. 1880, Vaccination against contagious diseases. 1885, Prevention of hydrophobia." These manifold researches form a continuous chain, each being linked to what precedes and follows. The devotion by which all were inspired, beginning with devotion to science and the fatherland, ended by embracing all mankind.
Biology, which in the sixteenth century sent out only a few feeble shoots, has now become a mighty tree with innumerable fruit-laden branches. The vigour of its latest outgrowths encourages confident hopes of future expansion.
[44] Titius of Wittenberg, who published in 1766 what is commonly called Bode's law of planetary distances, objected to the Linnean system on the ground that it multiplied the principle of division. (De divisione animalium generali, 1760.)
[45] Origin of Species, chap. xiii.
[46] Geol. Survey Memoirs, 1846.
[47] By a curious and no doubt accidental coincidence, Darwin employs the same remarkable metaphor which had occurred to Iordanes in the sixth century A.D. Iordanes calls the north the officina gentium.
[48] Introduction to Entomology, Introductory Letter.
[49] Life and Letters, Vol. I., chap. ii.
[50] Darwin, Variation of Plants and Animals under Domestication, Concluding Remarks.
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE
1200-1850
(The date of a discovery is the date of first publication, where this is known.)
THE SUB-DIVISIONS OF BIOLOGY
Morphology:
Anatomy.
Minute Anatomy.
Comparative Anatomy.
Embryology.
Physiology (including adaptations to the conditions of life).
Psychology of Animals.
Classification.
Geographical Distribution.
Palæontology.
All these divisions, except Psychology, apply both to plants and animals. Many other modes of division have been proposed.
BIBILIOGRAPHY
[It will be readily understood that the literature of Biology is enormous, as a single fact will show. Half a century ago Dr. Hagen compiled a list of books and papers relating to Entomology alone. Though far from complete, it filled a thousand pages, and if brought down to the present date would probably fill a thousand more. The student who tries to follow in some detail the history of any branch of Biology must read books in half-a-dozen languages, and work continually in large public libraries. We shall attempt no more in this place than to mention a few books which can be procured and read by those whose leisure and knowledge of the subject are limited.]