ON ALBUMEN AND OTHER ANIMAL FLUIDS. IQ 



In the foregoing experiments, I had generally employed Small electri- 

 from sixty to three hundred four-inch double plates of cop- gulateTalbu-*" 

 per and zinc, but in subsequent researches, made with a men. 

 view of ascertaining the action of lower powers, the effects 

 of which I shall afterward relate, 1 find that a battery of 

 twenty-four three-inch double plates is sufficient to effect a 

 perfect coagulation at the negative pole, even where the 

 albumen is diluted with so large a quantity of water, as not 

 to be detected by the usual tests. 



Sect. 2. Observations on the Composition of some animal 

 Fluids containing Albumen. 



Finding, from the experiments detailed in the preceding This test ap- 



section, that albumen may exist in such states of combina- p . VL *®' 

 J animal fluids. 



tion, as not to be detected by the usual tests, but separable 



by electrical decomposition, I was induced to apply this 



mode of analysis to the examination of animal fluids in 



general. 



1. Saliva. 



When saliva is boiled in water, a few flakes of coagulated Saliva. All ite 

 albumen are deposited ; but this is by no means the whole albumen c * n - 

 quantity of albumen contained in the secretion, for on apply- j^gj by bal- 

 ing the test of negative electricity to the filtered fluid ob- in gin water, 

 tained after the separation of the albumen by heat, a copi- ° r yaci s * 

 ous coagulation and separation of alkali are produced at the 

 negative pole. A large portion of albumen may therefore 

 exist in a fluid, incapable of separation by heat, and in the 

 present instance not to be detected even by acids, these re- 

 agents producing no effect on the filtered solution just al- 

 luded to. 



2. Mucus of the Oyster. 



The solution of mucus obtained by agitating oysters in Mucus of oys. 

 water exhibits to the usual tests no traces of albumen ; but ters contains 

 when acted upon by electricity from the Voltaic battery, a 



" Five hundred grains ©f dry albumen afforded 74 50 grains of coal, 

 " of which 11*25 were saline matter." 



See w Chemical Experiments on Zoophitci, with some Observation* 

 *» on the Component Parts of Membrane." Phil. Trans. 1800. 



C 2 considerable 



albumen. 



