TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 123 



sound produced by the issuing of the air from an air-condensing ap- 

 paratus, or from the mouth, — which very nearly resembled that of the 

 bellows, and the guttural respiratory sound, — was observed to have 

 passed freely, in one experiment, throughout an artery of eighteen 

 inches in length, and to be perceived very nearly, if not quite, as loud 

 in this as in another artery connected with it, and through which a 

 current of air passed. In another experiment, in which the lungs of 

 a lamb were used, sounds analogous to the tracheal, bronchial, and 

 vesicular respiratory murmurs were distinctly perceived, although no 

 current of air passed along the air tubes or cells ; and in the case of 

 a bladder attached to one of the great bifurcations of the trachea, 

 a sound louder than that in the bronchial tubes was perceived, when 

 the former was contracted to about an inch and a half or two inches 

 in diameter; feebler when larger, and assuming, as its size was in- 

 creased, a gentle, shrill, ringing, amphoric character. Dr. Spittal's 

 experiments were not advanced to prove that the guttural sound, or 

 that which takes place in the superior respiratory passages, is the only 

 source of the respiratory murmurs ; but to show that in all probability 

 it exerts a considerable influence, if not in producing, at least in modi- 

 fying, the different respiratory sounds, known as the vesicular, bron- 

 chial, tracheal, cavernous, and amphoric respiratory murmurs, all of 

 which have hitherto been explained according to the views of Laennec. 



On the Medicinal and Poisonous Properties of some of the Iodides. By 

 Dr. A. T. Thomson. 



The principal preparation whose action was detailed was the iodide 

 of arsenic. Different modes of preparation were pointed out, the cha- 

 racters of the substance described, and specimens exhibited. The ac- 

 tion of this medicine in very minute doses, namely, fi'om one-eighth to 

 one-third of a grain, was stated to have proved peculiarly serviceable 

 in lepra vulgaris, and chronic impetigo. A case of numerous tumours 

 resembling carcinoma, dispersed under the skin, especially that over the 

 mammae and in the axillae, was found to yield to its continued action, 

 and it was found equally successful in a more decided case of incipient 

 carcinoma. Its action as a poison when given in an overdose was mi- 

 nutely detailed in a series of experiments on dogs ; the effects being 

 very similar to those of arsenious acid. Coloured drawings of the 

 morbid effects of this substance on the alimentary canal were exhibited. 

 When injected into a vein, its effect was to destroy life, by destroying 

 the irritability of the heart. 



On the Placental Souffle. By Dr. Adams. 



The author detailed some remarkable stethoscopic phenomena occa- 

 sionally heard in connexion with placental souffle. 



