CAPABLE OF COMMON AND EASY PRACTICAL APPLICATION. 157 



The first six experiments of Table II were performed on 

 rabbits, with the result that only prolongation of life was 

 obtained. Thus, after a dose of 10 milligrammes per kilo- 

 gramme (Experiment 1), death took place only a little quicker 

 than after one-tenth of this dose in a control animal (Experi- 

 ment 5). Again, 5 milligrammes per kilogramme in a treated 

 animal caused death in 3| hours (Experiment 2), but 0'5 milli- 

 gramme per kilogramme in a control killed in the same time 

 (Experiment 6). The rapidity of death in this last animal 

 shows that 0-5 milligramme per kilogramme is still much above 

 the minimal lethal dose of cobra- venom for rabbits, so that the 

 doses used in the treated cases were many times a lethal dose 

 (about five to fifty times), and were thus mostly proportionally 

 larger doses than a cobra could eject in the case of a man. The 

 tissues of a rabbit are also more delicate than those of a cat or 

 of a man, so that absorption of the poison may be unusually 

 rapid in rabbits, which are extremely susceptible to snake- 

 venoms. 



Turning next to the results of the experiments on cats, much 

 more satisfactory results were obtained. Thus, the control 

 experiments showed that 1 milligramme per kilogramme pro- 

 duced death in 50 hours, this being the minimal lethal dose of 

 the cobra-venom used in these experiments for cats (Experi- 

 ment 15). A dose of 5 milligrammes per kilogramme caused 

 death in 28 hours, the time having probably been prolonged by 

 the application of a ligature after the injection (Experiment 12). 

 A dose of 10 milligrammes per kilogramme proved fatal in 

 3 hours, although a ligature had been applied as in the treated 

 cases (Experiment 8). On comparing the result of treated 

 cases with the above control we find only one death occurred in 

 six experiments. The one fatal result took place after a dose 

 of 5 milligrammes per kilogramme (Experiment 9), this having 

 been the first case treated, in which the permanganate was not 

 as thoroughly rubbed in, and the site of injection was not as 

 completely exposed as in later experiments, and in this case 

 death did not take place until over 30 hours. On the other 

 hand, in Experiment 7 recovery took place after 10 milli- 

 grammes per kilogramme (10 lethal doses), while in two other 



