Some other explanation must therefore be sought for this phenomenon. Great significance must be attached in this connection to the relation noted above between the degree of disintegration and disorganisation of the cell and the fall in the normal rate of fermentation. It seems not impossible that fermentation may be associated in the living cell with some special structure, or carried on in some special portion of the cell, perhaps the nuclear vacuole described by Janssens and Leblanc [1898], Wager [1898, 1911; Wager and Peniston, 1910] and others which undergoes remarkable changes both during fermentation and autofermentation [Harden and Rowland, 1901]. The disorganisation of the cell might lead to many modifications of the conditions, among others to the dilution of the various catalytic agents by diffusion throughout the whole volume of the cell. As a matter of observation the dilution of yeast-juice leads to a considerable diminution of the rate of fermentation of sugar, and it is possible that this is one of the chief factors concerned. That phenomena of this kind may be involved is shown by the remarkable effect of toluene on the autofermentation of yeast. Whereas the fermentation of sugar is greatly diminished by the action of toluene, the rate of autofermentation, which is carried on at the expense of the glycogen of the cell, is greatly increased. In a typical case, for example, the autofermentation of 10 grams of yeast suspended in 20 c.c. of water amounted to 28 c.c. in 4·8 hours [p127] at 25°, whereas the same amount of yeast in presence of 2 c.c. of toluene gave 97·6 c.c. in the same time. Many salts produce a similar effect on English top yeasts (in which the autofermentation is large) [Harden and Paine, 1912], whereas Neuberg and Karczag in Berlin [1911, 2] were unable to observe this phenomenon. A necessary preliminary of the fermentation of glycogen is its conversion by a diastatic enzyme into a fermentable sugar, and it is probable that the effect of the disorganisation of the cell by toluene is that this enzyme finds more ready access to the glycogen, which is stored in the plasma of the cell. No such acceleration of autofermentation is effected by the addition of toluene to yeast-juice, and hence the result is not due to an acceleration of the action of the diastatic enzyme on the glycogen. This effect of toluene is similar in character to the action of anæsthetics on the leaves of many plants containing glucosides and enzymes, whereby an immediate decomposition of the glucoside is initiated [see H. E. and E. F. Armstrong, 1910].