ON CUTANEOUS AERIFORM TRANSPIRATION. 53 



I judged thefe experiments to be more than fufficient to (how 

 that it was nitrogen gas. 



I again tranfmitted the refult of thefe new experiments to 

 Cit. Fourcroy, in Fru&idor of the year nine; probably his 

 occupations have prevented him from fending me any reply. 



Having fince that period reflected much on the importance 

 of this difcovery, I have continued to attend to it, but my 

 notions are entirely changed with regard to the confequences 

 to be drawn from it. 



Formerly in the letters written to Profeflfor Fourcroy, and Tne emlffion of 

 efpecially in the latter, I confidered as a particular facl, de- J ordered as a 

 pendant on the pathologic ftate ; at prefent I am compelled general pheno- 

 to conlider it as a general phenomenon belonging to the whole menon ' 

 human fpecies. 



111. Becaufe it is probable that the gas fo abundantly yielded 

 by the fkin of M. le Comte de Milly, was nitrogen gas, as 

 may be feen by an attentive perufal of his memoir. 



2d. M. Ingenhouz, convinced by his own experiments, that 

 an aeriform fluid is emitted by the fkin, believed if to be phlo- 

 gifticated gas (nitrogen gas.) 



3d. My experiments confirm the fufpicion of M. Ingen- 

 houz. 



4th. Some time ago I met with another perfon who tranf- 

 pired abundantly in the bath j the bubbles with which he is 

 conftantly covered are not dilTolved in the water, it is proba- 

 bably nitrogen gas, I acknowledge, however, that I have 

 never made any exacl experiment on it. 



. 5th. The experiments made by M. M. Prieftley, Fontana 

 and J urine, which confided in placing open veflels under their 

 arm-pits, do not prove any thing in oppoiition to what I have 

 before advanced, becaufe it is evident that thefe veflels being 

 full of atmofpheric air, it could not be difplaced by nitrogen 

 gas, whofe fpecific gravity is lefs ; while this effect would 

 have taken place with carbonic acid gas, if, as M. Jurine 

 infers from his experiments, that this laft fluid is conftantly 

 difengaged by the fkin. 



Thofe made by M. Jurine, by placing his arm in a glafs cy- 

 linder, are not more conclulive, becaufe they were performed 

 with a view to prove that it was carbonic acid gas which ef- 

 caped, and the proper means were not taken to point out the 

 prefence and the quantity of nitrogen gas, whofe difengage- 

 ment he did not even fufpeft. 



M 



