NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADELPHIA. 379 



After studying this experiment again and again, one cannot help 

 being struck with the circumstance of so eminent a physiologist 

 and therapeutist drawing such an unwarrantable conclusion. He 

 must have been either totally ignorant of, or he entirely ignores 

 the investigations of Kolliker, Gultman, and Verigo. Had he at- 

 tempted to galvanize one of the sciatic nerves of the paralyzed 

 animal, he would, nay could, never have made such a mistake. 



Besides this experiment the only reason that Harley gives for 

 believing that the corpora striata are the parts affected, " is the 

 extreme rapidity with which the paralyzing influence radiates 

 through the body." For the same reason it might be said that 

 the strychnia convulsions are cerebral, or that the paralysis of 

 physostigma and atropia were due to a similar action on the cor- 

 pora striata. 



After studying the various papers on the subject, it will be seen 

 that the cause of the paralysis is still somewhat undecided. It 

 is very plain that it can be produced in four different ways : 

 first, it may be cerebral, i. e., due to a direct action on the motor 

 centres within the brain ; second, it may be due to spinal para- 

 lysis ; third, it may be muscular, i. e., due to a direct action on 

 the muscles ; fourth, it may be peripheral, i. e., due to paralysis of 

 the peripheral ends of the efferent or motor nerves. 



That the paralysis of conia-poisoning is not muscular is proved 

 b} T the fact, which has frequently been noted, and which the writer 

 has repeatedly confirmed, that muscles taken from an animal com- 

 pletely paralyzed by conia paralyzed to such an extent that 

 galvanic irritation through the nerves fails to excite contrac- 

 tions can be made to contract most energetically when the 

 galvanic current is applied directly to the muscles. Nay, further, 

 the irritability of the muscles through which the blood poisoned 

 by conia has been permitted to pass is as great and as long con- 

 tinued as that of muscles of the same animal protected from the 

 action of the poisoned blood by ligature of the bloodvessels. 



Before discussing the question of the cause of the paralysis any 

 further I can probably make the remainder of my experiments 

 clearer by giving an account of several which were made to dis- 

 cover whether or not the application of the galvanic current to 

 the nerves of an animal paralyzed by conia will produce contrac- 

 tions in the tributary muscles. 



Exp. 23. On a large frog. The right sciatic nerve exposed and 



