490 GENCHO FUJIMURA 



function, the basis of his arguments being the striking resemblance 

 from the view-point of morphology, between the decidual cells and 

 those of the other internal secretory glands. In order to demon- 

 strate this, Gentili, in the same laboratory as Sfameni, carried 

 out experiments by the use of the decidual juice on the dog, 

 the rabbit, and the frog, and it was found that, similar to the 

 luteal cells of the ovary, the decidual cells have a special action 

 upon both the circulatory and generative organs. Schottliinder 

 also, by assuming that it may be possible for the secretion of 

 the glandular cells in the spongious layer of the decidua in the 

 first month of pregnancy perhaps to enter the mother's blood 

 directly, recognized seemingly that the uterine glands at times 

 have the significance of an internal secretory gland. Aschheim, 

 in 1915, by discovering plenty of lipoid in the decidual cells, 

 imagined the existence of a special function in these cells. Last- 

 ly, Gentili and Binaghi, by conducting a microchemical experi- 

 ment on the various tissue elements which form the decidua of a 

 cow, demonstrated the existence of a kind of lipoid in the tissues, 

 as reflexive of the correlation which it seems they believed exist- 

 ing between a certain function, particularly an internal secretion 

 of the decidual cells, and the lipoid. On a close examination of 

 the result of researches made by these authors, it must be stated 

 that even in those whose view was in favor of an internal secretion 

 in the decidua the basis of arguments presented is in general as 

 feeble as in the case of an internal secretion of the placenta. 

 It is a long time since I began to feel interested in the secre- 

 tory function of the placenta and the decidua. I was ever of 

 the opinion that both the placenta and the decidua have a 

 certain secretory function, and the experimental method I 

 adopted in investigating this subject was entirely different from 

 that employed by the foregoing authors. That is to say, I con- 

 ducted a serological research into the effects which the alchoholic 

 extract of the placenta and the decidua has upon the mother's 

 blood, and the result was the discovery in the serum during 

 pregnancy of, not only the well-known Abderhalden's ^4bbau- 

 ferment,' but also of such an antibody as has a property of 

 the fixation of complement with ingredients of the extract 



