Louis Pasteur: His Life and LaboursVallery-Radot, René
Science
Louis Pasteur: His Life and Labours
Vallery-Radot, René
Pasteur, Louis, 1822-1895; Scientists -- France -- Biography
During these forced experiments Pasteur observed that out of sixteen
broods derived from non-corpusculous parents, fifteen succeeded, while
the sixteenth perished almost entirely between the fourth moulting
and the climbing on to the brambles. After having exhibited a most
healthful appearance, the worms died suddenly. In a cultivation of
100 worms, ten, fifteen, twenty dead ones were picked up daily: these
turned black, and became putrid with extraordinary rapidity, often
within the space of twenty-four hours. Sometimes they were soft and
flabby, like an empty, crumpled intestine. Consulting the authors who
had written upon silkworms, Pasteur could not doubt that he had before
his eyes a characteristic specimen of the disease called _morts-flats_,
or _flacherie_. Not only were these worms free from all _pébrine_
spots, but no corpuscles were to be found in any part of their bodies.
A still more significant fact was, that corpuscles were also absent
from the chrysalides and the moths of those few worms which were able
to spin their cocoons. Although this sample was confined to a single
group of eggs derived from parents free from corpuscles, Pasteur
continued to entertain doubts as to the existence of only a single
disease, and also as to the necessary connection of _pébrine_ with
_flacherie_.
These suspicions were confirmed by his cultivations of April and
May. Numerous cases of _flacherie_ presented themselves. Uncertainty
was no longer possible as to the mutual independence of the two
maladies--_pébrine_ and _flacherie_. The cultivations most seriously
invaded by the last-mentioned disease came from eggs produced by
parents free from corpuscles, and led on to reproducers also free from
this parasite. On visiting a multitude of industrial cultivations,
Pasteur discerned that what had passed in his own laboratory was of
very general occurrence, and that, contrary to the received opinion,
two distinct maladies divided between them the cause of all the
misfortunes. _Pébrine_ was evidently the most widely spread, but
_flacherie_ had also its share, and a very large share, in the calamity.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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