DEGENERATION OF THE HEART. 115 



fectly white light for illumination. Though in many parts 

 the green colours had entirely faded, the specimen being 

 mounted in water, yet Mr. Brooke found clusters of molecular 

 deposit, the colour of which he declared to be green beyond 

 any doubt. He was quite positive about that. Even when 

 he used a second power in the place of an eye-piece, which 

 arrangement affords an exquisitely high magnifying power, and 

 with a careful adjustment affords a beautifully clear view of the 

 object, the colour of the clusters of molecular deposit appeared 

 to him (and to myself) perfectly green. Two days after 

 there was only a vestige of the deep-green colour left ; it had 

 decomposed, and dissolved in the fluid surrounding the 

 specimen. 



I have gone to such length, because, if the report of Drs. 

 Habershon and Bristowe stands unexplained, either my 

 veracity or the correctness of my sight might be doubted, 

 and for either I should be very sorry indeed. But happily 

 there are some witnesses to the green colour of the deposit 

 before it was decomposed, and to this fact my character and 

 that of my eye look for protection. 



Already, in the note to my paper in the ' Transactions ' at 

 the Pathological Society, I have recorded my opinion on that 

 degeneration, the produce of which, said to be fat, does not 

 dissolve in ether. Tiiere is no fat, either in the vegetable or 

 animal kingdon which does not dissolve in ether and volatile 

 oils (Lehmann, 'Theoretical Chemistry,' 3rd edit, p 273.) It 

 is, therefore, an error to call a deposit fat which does not 

 dissolve in ether. 



Since I saw green pigment for the first time, I have ex- 

 amined a great number of hearts and found green pigment in 

 three more instances. In one case where the colour was most 

 conspicuous, I was afforded a good opportunity of Avitnessing 

 how quickly the green colour is changed by decomposition 

 It was in June ; the heart stood for two days on a plate, 

 covered by a saucer ; on being uncovered it was found to 

 be in the first stage of putrefaction, viz., smelling badly, 

 covered with greasy matter and exuding brown serum. The 

 green pigment was found to have changed its colour into 

 a dirty earth-brown, and only here and there a faint indication 

 of the former colour could be distinguished. 



I think it only just to say that my paper was read and the 

 report thereon given, before I was aware or it had been stated 

 that Wedl and Kolliker mention a similar deposit. Corro- 

 boration of mj' observations is accumulating. Rokitansky, at 

 p. 189 of the new (3rd) edition of his ' Pathological Anatomy,' 

 speaks of granular pigment deposited in striated muscular 



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