a 8 



FIXED SALINE CONSTITUENTS. 



constructed upon one great plan. Pathological conditions of the most highly 

 organized animals are found to exist as the normal and permanent conditions of 

 those placed below in the scale of creation. If the forces of a warm-blooded animal 

 be reduced, it presents a condition in many respects similar to that of a cold-blooded 

 animal. We will illustrate this by one other example. 



Warm-blooded animals, in health, are able to maintain their temperature at a 

 fixed standard, regardless of that of the surrounding medium. As the surrounding 

 temperature descends, the efforts of nature to sustain a definite degree of heat 

 increase. If, however, the forces of the animal economy be impaired, the efforts of 

 nature are no longer sufficient to keep the body heated to the normal degree, and 

 gradually the body assumes the temperature of the surrounding medium. Tbe 

 intellect and all the organic forces become torpid, the chemical actions cease, or 

 are performed in a feeble or perverted manner; and, finally, the once active and 

 warm-blooded animal is reduced to the condition of a sluggish cold-blooded one. 



This table also apparently shows that the fibrin is one of the most variable of 

 all the constituents of the blood. This, however, probably arises in great measure 

 from imperfections in our methods of analysis. 



We shall next consider the amount of fixed saline constituents in the blood of 

 different animals. 



