French National Injlitute. 293 



FRENCH NATIONAL INSTITUTE. 



Account of the labours of the Mathematical and Phyilcal 

 Oafs, during the fecond quarter of the year 10. — Continued 

 from No. 47. 



Zoohgy. — C. Cuvier communicated to the clafs a great 

 number of observations, which he made on the worms which 

 contain a greater or lefs quantity of red blood, and fimilar to 

 that which circulates in animals that have vertebrae. A 

 fluid more or lefs red had long been remarked in the earth- 

 worm ; but, as a fluid of the fame colour had been feen in 

 t lie larvae of feveral infects, it was not known whether that 

 of the earth-worm was real blood. About four years ago 

 C. Cuvier removed all doubt on this fubject, and, after de- 

 fcribing the vafcular fyftem of the earth-worm and leech, 

 proved that the red fluid of thefe two animals is a real fan- 

 guine fluid. In the courfe of lad autumn this naturalift was 

 enabled to extend his refearches on this part fo interefting 

 to the phyfiology of animals. He obferved phaenomena far 

 more general, and consequently more remarkable, than thofe 

 he had dilcovered before. He found (hat all articulated worms, 

 fuch as the naiades, nereides, aphrodites, amphinomes, tere- 

 bdlae, amphitrytes, and ferpules have red blood; that this 

 fluid circulates in a complete fyftem of arteries and veins, and 

 that it proceeds to the branchiae, or to the furfaceof the (kin, 

 to alTume a red colour, by an operation analogous to refpi ra- 

 tion in man and animals with vertebrae. 



Medicine. — C. Percy, aflbciate, read medical and philofo- 

 phical obfervations on an univerfaf aficylofis, or immobility of 

 all the articulations, and exhibited to the clafs the fkeleton 

 of the unfortunate fubjec"t, who lived twelve years in that 

 ftate, worfe than death, of which, according to C. Percy, it 

 was a dreadful image and a long precurfor. 



This furgeon in chief of the armies, after quoting inftances 

 of ancyloiis ohferved by different phyficians, and particularly 

 by Real, Colomb, and C. Portal, informed the clafs that 

 C. Francois-Maurice Marcieu de Simorre, an officer in 

 the army, had contracted, during the campaigns in Corfica, 

 a rheumatic gout which fucceffively deprived him of the ufe 

 of his ringers, hands and feet; which, after producing the 

 moil violent pain, made it impoflible for him to move any 

 part of his body, and even hid lower jaw; and which at length 

 put an end to his exiftence. He fpent feveral years in aa 

 eafy chair, without enjoying a moment's deep, notwithstand- 

 ing the (trongclt doles of opium. Being reduced to fuch a 

 ftatc, as to be able to fuck only a little foup or wine through 



Vol. XIII. No. 51. U the 



