L 192 ] 



XXXV. On some Nexv Species of Animal Concretions. 

 By Thomas Taylor, Surgeon. 



[Continued from p. 46.] 



Resino-bezoardic Acid Calculi. 



T^ERY shortly after commencing the examination of the 

 * calculi in the College collection, my attention was drawn 

 to several concretions which possessed the easy fusibility and 

 genei'al characters of a resin, and which were described in 

 the MS. Catalogue as " false West Indian Bezoars," on the 

 supposition that they were artificial compounds. The peculiar 

 characters however of the resin of which they consisted, and 

 their finely laminated structure, which it would be impossible 

 to imitate, left no doubt on my mind of their being genuine 

 bezoars, and in January 1841 I described them to the 

 Museum Committee as consisting of a vegetable resin, derived 

 most probably from the resinous juices of the plants on which 

 the wild goats of the East had fed. In the same year a very 

 interesting paper appeared in the Annalcn der Cliemie und 

 Pharmacie, by M. Goebel, describing a new species of calculus 

 which he had found in the Zoological Museum at Dorpat, 

 and to which, on the supposition of its being a biliary con- 

 cretion, he gave the name of lithofelU.iic acid. A similar cal- 

 culus from the Pathological Museum at Gottingen was shortly 

 after examined by Professor Wohler. 



The similarity in chemical characters of the concretions ex- 

 amined by these chemists with the resinous concretions pre- 

 viously examined by myself, rendered it certain that they 

 were identical in composition; but as it was important to de- 

 termine whether they were biliary calculi or simply intestinal 

 concretions, derived from the materials of the food, I repeated 

 at some length my experiments, but without coming to any 

 other conclusion than that formerly expressed. The reasons 

 which have induced me therefore to place the calculi among 

 the intestinal calculi in the College Catalogue are as follows. 



In the first place, the greater number of them contain, as 

 the subjoined analysis will show, a small quantity of a soft 

 viscid resin, resembling a vegetable balsam. 



Secondly. They resemble all other concretions formed in 

 the intestines, by having a foreign body, as a piece of wood 

 or a seed, for their nucleus. 



Thirdly. They frequently attain a very large size, quite 

 inconsistent with the notion of their being biliary concretions, 

 or having been contained in the gall-bladder. There is one 

 specimen in the Museum which measures three inches and a 

 half in length, and the same in its greatest breadth. This 



