Some mineral acids, as H2SO4 and HCl, and some organic acids, are regarded as lifeless ferments. To this class are thought to belong the diastase of malt and the pepsin of the stomach. This variety of ferments exists in the seeds of all plants, and changes starch to glucose. 331. Bread which is raised by yeast is fermented, the object being to produce CO2, bubbles of which, with the alcohol, cause the dough to rise and make the bread light. Grapes and other fruits ferment and produce wines, etc., from which distilled liquors are obtained. 332. Lactic Fermentation changes the sugar of milk, lactose, to lactic acid, i.e. sour milk. In canning fruit, any germs present are killed by heating, and those from the air are excluded by sealing the can. Milk has been kept sweet for years by boiling, and tightly covering the receptacle with two or three folds of cotton cloth. 333. Putrefaction is fermentation in which the products of decay are ill-smelling. Saprophytes attack the dead matter, feed on it, and cause it to putrefy. This action, as well as that of ordinary fermentation, used to be attributed solely to oxygen. Germs bring back organic matter to a more elementary state, and so have a very important function. By some scientists, digestion is regarded as a species of fermentation, probably due to the action of lifeless ferments; e.g. sucrose cannot be taken into the system, but is first fermented to glucose. 334. Most Infectious Diseases are now thought to be due to parasites of various kinds, such as bacteria, microbes, etc., with which the victim often swarms, and which feed on his tissues, multiplying with enormous rapidity. Such diseases are small-pox, intermittent and yellow fevers, etc. Consumption, or tuberculosis, is believed to be caused by a microbe which destroys the lungs. In some diseases not less than fifteen billions of the organisms are estimated to exist in a cubic inch. These multiply so rapidly that from a single germ in forty-eight hours may be produced nearly three hundred billions. These germs do not spring into life spontaneously from inorganic matter, but come from pre-existent similar forms. Parasites are not so rare in the system even of a healthy person as is generally supposed. They are found on our teeth and in many of the tissues of the body. Several infectious diseases are now warded off or rendered less virulent by vaccination, the philosophy of which is that the organisms are rendered less dangerous by domestication; several crops, or generations, are grown in a prepared liquid, each less injurious than its parent. Some of the more domesticated ones are introduced into the system, and the person has only a modified form of the disease, often scarcely any at all, and is for a more or less limited time insured against further danger. Dust particles and motes floating in the air are in part germs, living or dead, often requiring only moisture and mild temperature for resuscitation. Most of these are harmless.