272 OF THE ABSORBENT VESSELS. 



pressing or liberating the vein under the finger and thumb. But 

 here again an objection presents itself, which in fact applies 

 likewise to all the preceding experiments : not only has Mr.Bracy 

 Clarke discovered communications in the horse between the 

 lymphatic system and lumbar veins,* but M.Majendie allows that 

 the absorbents communicate with arteries, and may frequently be 

 injected from them : the poison might consequently on his own 

 admission be imagined to be taken up by lymphatics, carried into 

 small blood-vessels, and conveyed with the blood through the vein 

 to the body. Indeed, as the poison was placed in a wound, it 

 might contaminate the blood without being absorbed. Against 

 the result of an experiment in which, after a solution of prussiate 

 of potass was swallowed, the salt was discoverable in the urine 

 and not in the lymph, M. Majendie himself supplies an objection 

 when treating of the urine. For he states that a minute portion 

 of this substance may be readily detected in the urine, while the 

 quantity in the blood must be large to be discoverable. As the 

 contents of the thoracic duct so nearly resemble blood, he should 

 have ascertained whether it is not difficult to detect in them also 

 a portion of the prussiate which would be easily manifest in the 

 urine. A similar experiment with a decoction of rhubarb, lies 

 under the same difficulty. 



In starting all these doubts, I am only desirous of showing that 

 M. Majendie's experiments are not so unobjectionable as he 

 believes, and readily grant that Mr. Hunter's experiments deserve 

 repetition and the whole subject farther investigation. I am 

 not prepared to deny that veins absorb, or, what comes to nearly 

 the same thing, that there are lymphatics which do not form 

 trunks but convey their contents to small blood-vessels j and 

 I have nothing to suggest against the following facts. 



" Three ounces of diluted alcohol were given to a dog j in a 

 quarter of an hour the blood of the animal had a decided sineil 

 of alcohol ; the lymph (of the thoracic duct) had none." 



"In the horse, the usual contents of both the large and sinall 



* llces's Cyclopedia : Anatomy, Veterinary. 



