THE MICROSCOPE. 107 



of the corpuscles seen in fresh ox blood, but they had to some extent 

 lost their color, so that they appeared paler than normal, and made 

 it somewhat difficult for me to obtain a micro-negative of sufficient 

 density for printing. (See fig. i). Most of them were round, but 

 I saw also a number which were crenated and distorted in shape. I 

 again noticed the globular bodies resembling oil globules, and they 

 appeared to be about twice the size of the red blood corpuscle, 

 although some were larger and others smaller. (See fig. 3). \Vith 

 a view to determine whether they were oil or not I introduced vari- 

 ous coloring solutions under the cover glass of the specimens and 

 found that these globules were brightly stained by most of the ani- 

 line colors but not by carmine or indigo, thus proving them to be 

 something else than oil globules. 



In this second set of specimens I noticed in one or two in- 

 stances a few bands of fibrin (fig. 3) and some extraneous matter in 

 the shape of dust, both in very minute quantities. 



I next made a solution of the dried blood in some artificial gas- 

 tric juices, and after it had remained in an incubator for four 

 hours, I prepared specimens from it for microscopical examination. 

 In these I found no trace of my blood corpuscles, but the field of 

 the microscope was filled with a brownish amorphous mass contain- 

 ing a few minute granules. In none of the specimens examined 

 thus far had I been able to discover any flakes of coagulated albu- 

 men. 



Finally, in order to find, if possible, the origin of the globular 

 bodies whose nature I had not been able to determine, I placed the 

 thinnest flake of dried blood I could pick out, upon a slide, and after 

 applying the cover glass, examined it under the microscope. Noth- 

 ing was visible but a dark mass with here and there a faint suspicion 

 of the outline of a blood corpuscle. I then allowed a drop of the 

 salt solution to run under the cover and watch the gradual solution 

 of the flake. Thus I saw how little by little small masses were loos- 

 ened from the large flake, and in them the outline of the blood cor- 

 puscles became distinctly visible, and these were held together by a 

 straw colored amorphous stroma. Presently I noticed that a large 

 globule loosened itself from this stroma, becoming subdivided into 

 smaller ones, in which I recognized the same globular bodies seen in 

 the other specimens. Thus I suspected that they were globules of 

 albumen which had not been entirely dissolved by the salt solution, 



