82 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
It has occurred to me that an analogous method might possibly be 
employed in order to render functionless the chromaphil tissue which 
constitutes the medulla of the adrenal body, and so determine whether 
‘this portion of the gland or the cortex is the part which is essential to 
life. I hope to carry out a series of experiments in this direction at an 
early date. It seems probable that exposure of the medulla and treat- 
ment of the incised gland with bichromate solution might kill the tissue 
of the medullary portion (by combining with adrenin or its immediate 
precursors) while the cortex would either not be affected at all or only 
to a much smaller degree. This method of extirpation of the adrenal 
medulla seems to me well worth a trial. The precise effects produced 
by the application of bichromate for varying periods of time will of 
course have to be carefully tested by histological examination whether 
the animal survives for a longer or a shorter time. 
In some of the preparations of the chromaphil body stained by the 
intra vitam method a certain number of the veins in the immediate 
neighbourhood of the body have taken on the characteristic brown 
stain. This observation may be not without significance in regard to the 
process of internal secretion on the part of the chromaphil body. So 
far I have not observed a similar appearance in the case of bodies stained 
post mortem. 
There seems to be a difference in tint between the body stained 
intra vitam and the body stained post mortem. In the former case the 
colour assumed is redder and the appearance more transparent, while 
in the latter the colour is browner and the appearance more opaque. 
There is a still further difference between the results obtained by the 
two methods. After some hours in running water the intra vitam stain 
becomes removed while the post mortem stain is permanent under these 
conditions. This result is probably to some extent determined by a 
difference of permeability of the tissues to the adrenin-bichromate 
compound in the living and the dead conditions. 
