183 



cles have not changed tlieir phiccs with regard (o each other, as 

 long as the coarse fibril, swollen under the influence of alkali, 

 entirely resumes its former shape and qualities when exposed to 

 acid, salt or' water. 



If the fibrin mass, swollen by alkali or acid, has absorbed all 

 the fluid, and is left to itself, then, after some days, the swollen 

 mass (we mean here ordinary impure fibrin) first passes into a thick 

 and then into a thin, colloid solution. It appears to me that we must 

 look upon this process as a continuation of the swelling-process, 

 mentioned before. The colloid-particles retaining in the swollen fibril 

 their coherence, their place with regard to each other, are driven 

 apart by the continual swelling and at last pass into a colloid solu- 

 tion, into a sol-state. 



If this view is correct, this colloid solution, this alkali-hydro-sol it' 

 I may call it thus, must have the same qualities as the swollen 

 fibril, and we saw already that this is indeed the case. 



For we saw that flakes are formed in a fibrin-NaOH-solution by 

 neutralization, by stronger acids, and by the action of salts under 

 the successive formation of a coagulum of fibres, of an elastic gel, 

 which may either remain somewhat swollen, as is .the case when it is 

 treated with a saturated NaCl-solution, or a coagulum with little or 

 no swelling, a retracting, fibrous or spongy mass may be formed as 

 was observed under the action of acids and acid salts, of CaCl^-sol, 

 and of a saturated NaFl-sol. 



The solution of fibrin in stronglj' diluted alkali gives rise, as we 

 saw, to an alkali-adsorption compound. And since bloodplasm 

 kept fluid, and also a transudate, were acted upon in a similar 

 manner by acids and salts, as a solution of fibiin in strongly diluted 

 NaOH, both as regards the formation of flakes and the succeeding 

 agglutination iji the form of fibrils, in other w^ords the coagulation, 

 it may confidently be iissmned tlvdtjibrinoc/en, as /tnm(l in trmisudates, 

 in bloodplasm kept jiuid, and hence also in blood, may be looked 

 upon as an alkali-adsorption compound of fibrin. In other words 

 fibrinogen as found in blood must be looked upon as an alkali- 

 hydrosol of fibrin, as fibrin in a colloid solution in which the fibrin- 

 particles are found in an exceedingly fine state of division, owing to 

 the adsorbed ions of OH. 



It seems to me that hereby the nature of the relation between 

 fibrinogen and fibrin it has been determined, but likewise that it has 

 been shown that blood contains a source of alkali in an extremely 

 loose compound, in the form of fibrinogen. A compound so loose 

 that it must be judged capable of giving up at any moment its 



