“I was much touched by what you tell me of Marshal Vaillant’s kind interest in my health, and also by his kind thought in informing me of the encouragement given to my studies by the Society of Agriculture. I wish the cultivators of your South had a little of his scientific and methodical spirit. “Madame Pasteur joins with me in sending you and your family, dear master, the expression of my gratitude and affectionate devotion.” The normal season for the culture of silkworms was now aproaching, and Pasteur was impatient to accumulate the proofs which would vouch for the safety of his method; this had been somewhat doubted by the members of the Lyons Silks Commission, who possessed an experimental nursery. Most of those gentlemen averred that too much confidence should not be placed in the micrographs. “Our Commission,” thus ran their report of the preceding year, “considers the examination of corpuscles as a useful indication which should be consulted, but of which the results cannot be presented as a fact from which absolute consequences can be deducted.” “They _are_ absolute,” answered Pasteur, who did not admit reservations on a point which he considered as invulnerable. On March 22, 1869, the Commission asked Pasteur for a little guaranteed healthy seed. Pasteur not only sent them this, but also sample lots, of which he thus predicted the future fate:-- 1. One lot of healthy seed, which would succeed; 2. One lot of seed, which would perish exclusively from the corpuscle disease known as pébrine or gattine; 3. One lot of seed, which would perish exclusively from the flachery disease; 4. One lot of seeds, which would perish partly from corpuscle disease and partly from flachery. “It seems to me,” added Pasteur, “that the comparison between the results of those different lots will do more to enlighten the Commission on the certainty of the principles I have established than could a mere sample of healthy seed. “I desire that this letter should be sent to the Commission at its next meeting, and put down in the minutes.” The Commission accepted with pleasure these unexpected surprise boxes. About the same time one of his assistants, Maillot, started for Corsica at M. de Casabianca’s request. He took with him six lots of healthy seed to Vescovato, a few miles from Bastia.