72 THE ACTION OF THE LIVING CELL 



tion uniformly assume that incident to an injury some 

 substance is liberated from the tissues which initiates 

 the series of changes which finally lead to the forma- 

 tion of the fibrin clot. While the nature of this tissue 

 substance and its mode of action are still in dispute, its 

 importance in initiating the clotting process is quite 

 generally accepted. For our present purposes, how- 

 ever, the exact details of the clotting process are im- 

 material. The fact that the blood of anesthetized 

 animals coagulates more rapidly than that of normal 

 animals is indicative of the fact that prolonged anes- 

 thesia causes the liberation of tissue components in 

 much the same fashion as does a traumatic injury. 



When serum drawn from an animal under anes- 

 thesia for three hours was added to a drop of normal 

 blood, agglutinization of the corpuscles occurred im- 

 mediately. Serum from animals anesthetized for 

 longer periods exhibited this agglutination action even 

 after a fivefold dilution. 



Frequently the immediate coagulation of blood has 

 been noted after prolonged anesthesia. However, it 

 is not generally realized that this is due to some sub- 

 stance formed in the circulating blood as a result of 

 the action of the anesthetic. The author in 1902-3 

 observed that the addition of "shock serum" to an 

 equal quantity of normal blood resulted in the im- 

 mediate coagulation of the latter. In general it was 

 found that the intensity of the agglutinizing and clot 

 forming reactions depended upon the duration of the 

 anesthesia. Little such action was noted with the sera 

 of animals anesthetized for an hour or two, whereas 

 longer periods of narcosis invariably led to the for- 

 mation of such agglutinins and precititins. For the 



