524 OF ABSORPTION AND SANG-UIFICATION. 



donkey, previously to their entrance into the thoracic duct: the animal having 

 had a full meal seven hours before its death. 



CHYLE. LYMPH. 



Welter 90-237 95-536 



Albuminous matter (eoagulable by heat) . . . 3-516 1-200 



Fibrinous matter (spontaneously coagulable) . . . 0-370 0-120 



Animal extractive matter, soluble in water and alcohol' . 0-332 0-240 



Animal extractive matter, soluble in water only . . 1"233 1.319 



Fatty matter ......... 3'601 a trace. 



Salts; Alkaline chloride, sulphate and carbonate, with traces of 



alkaline phosphate, oxide of iron .... 0-711 0-585 



100-000 100-000 



The Lymph obtained from the neck of a horse has been recently analyzed by 

 Nasse, with nearly the same result. He found it to contain 95 per cent, of 

 water; and the 5 per cent, of solid matter was chiefly composed of albumen 

 and fibrine, with watery extractive, scarcely a trace of fat being to be found. 

 The proportions of saline matter were found to be remarkably coincident with 

 those which exist in the serum of the blood; as might be expected from the 

 fact, that the fluid portion of the lymph must have its origin in that which has 

 transuded through the blood-vessels : the absolute quantity, however, is rather 

 less. A similar analysis of the Chyle of a cat by Nasse, has given results 

 very closely correspondent with that of Dr. Rees; for the proportion of water 

 was 90'5 per cent. ; and of the 9'5 parts of solid matter, the albumen, fibrine, 

 and extractive amounted to more than 5, and the fat to more than 3 parts. 

 Dr. Rees has also analyzed the fluid of the Thoracic duct of Man ; and found 

 it to consist of 90'48 per cent, of water, 7'08 parts of albumen and fibrine, 

 1'08 parts of aqueous and alcoholic extractive, and 0'92 of fatty matter, with 

 Q'44 per. cent, of salines. Thus the composition of this fluid would seem to 

 resemble that of the Lymph, rather than that of the Chyle ; the proportion of 

 the fatty to that of the albuminous matter being very small. This, however, 

 might have been very probably due to the circumstance, that the subject from 

 which the fluid was obtained (an executed criminal) had eaten but little for 

 some hours before his death. 



692. The characters of the Chyle drawn from the larger absorbent trunks, 

 near their entrance into the Receptaculum Chyli, are very different, however, 

 from those of the fluid as first absorbed into the Lacteals ; for during its 

 passage through these vessels, and their ganglia or glands, it undergoes 

 important alterations, which gradually assimilate it to Blood. The chyle 

 drawn from the lacteals that traverse the intestinal walls, contains Albumen in 

 a state of complete solution ; but it is generally destitute of the power of co- 

 agulation, no Fibrine being present in it. The Salts, also, are completely 

 dissolved; but the Oily matter presents itself in the form of globules of varia- 

 ble size.* It is generally supposed, that the milky colour of the chyle is 

 owing to these; but Mr. Gulliver has recently pointed outt that it is really due 

 to an immense multitude of far more minute particles, which he describes as 

 forming the molecular base of the chyle. These molecules are most abundant 

 in rich, milky, opaque chyle ; and in poorer chyle, which is semi-transparent 

 or opaline, the particles float thinly or separately in the transparent fluid, and 

 often exhibit the vivid motions common to the most minute molecules of vari- 

 ous substances. Such is their minuteness, that, even with the best instru- 



* These oily globules are more abundant in the Chyle of Man and of the Carnivora, than 

 jn that of the Herbivora : their diameter has been observed to vary from l-25,000th to l-2000th 

 of an inch. 



t Dublin Medical Press, Jan. 1, 1840, and Gerber's General Anatomy, Appendix, p. 88. 



