, 1873-06-15
ANIMAL PuTREFAcTl0h

TO the Editor Of 7As Chicago Tribune:
g1R: In your Issue OF the 9th inst. find q
communication purporting to be reply to my
article on animal Putrefaotion," published in
your columns on the 1st inst. Although have
no desire to enter into controversy with I lay
man (as this correspondent p1eases to style
himself on subject of scientific research, yet
his peryersiong and misstatements are such Al
to make correction of them necessary.
I am asked why it is that the condenaers tn
Bridgeport rendering establishments do not con-
dense al the volatile oils and fumes that escape
from the rendering tanks, while distinctly
stated that these volatile substances could be
"condenBed or burned :" in other words, that
the less volatile ones could be condensed, and
the others burned. Thus every sensible man
must have understood it. By the way, may
state that the condensers which so far have bean
tried in Bridgeport are, AZ is generally admitted,
by no means perfect, and those trials Of which
your correspondent speaks 80 emphatically have,
until recently, been conducted and devised by
laymsn, Of whom likely Mr- I'll" your coHe-
arondent, is one-
products Of putrefaction are used in other mix
tures as perfumeries and favora for eatables,
nobody viii doubt the truth OF this statement
while knowing that the butyric, valerianio, and
other ethers which form portion Of th the d.s:
Of mcst OF our artificial perfumes and
aavors, as sfell as Of the delightful odor
Of many lovely flower. Do anywhere
speak .of elementary constituents Are COM
hinatons of volatile acids elementary substan-
that point? Nevertheless, it pleascs Mr. H.,
the layman, to make me- speak OF elementary
constituents, in order to get up some grounds
from which he can draw conclusions OF. his own.
Fve1,ir 1,o fJ1
complacency by his catechism on chemistry. It
il fact probably not stated in the anony-
nous laynan's .*First Reader On Chem-
istry," but nevertheless correct, that,
tie substances Of he smell Of q flower, however
lovely OF disagreeable it may be, boars the same
relation to the flower and to vegetable life that
the e1crements bear to the animal and to animal
life. Both the smell Of the flower and that Of
the excrements Of the animal are products Of
reg1essive metamorphosis. As to this 1ayman's
proposition, which he quotes from his First
~Reader Oh Chemistry" On the interminglng OF
gases with the atmosphere, I would advise him
to consult his Second Reader,' - when he gets
that far. Probably he will there find something
on the intermiusing Of vapors with the atuos-
phere-
find some consolation in seeing that the chemist
"whose name WIS L.eblg does not fare better
at tie }ayman' 3 hands. He goes On to state that
thia chemist had described process which he
called eremacausis, according to which, cholera
poison, il it CHANGED to come IN contact with
putrefying animal matter, will breed ne" and
enormous quantities of cho1era-poison. NOW,
the fnct ie, 1iebig has written on eremacauss,
which, in plain words, means simply decay, or
process OF allow combustion OF o1ydaton, and 30
have other eminent chemists before and after
him; and all agree that in this process Of decay,
particular fe1ment is produced, which w pro,
oxyfah1e HufatAnce9 with which It comes IN con-