On muscular Motion. 2 1 9 



touched. After remaining thirty minutes under water, the 

 animal was laid upon flamiel;, in an atmosphere of 62% with 

 its head inclined downwards ; it soon began to relax the 

 sphincter muscle which contracts -the skin, slow respira- 

 tions commenced, and it recovered entirely, without arti- 

 ficial aid, after two hours. Another hedge-hoo, submersed 

 in water at 94°, remained quiet until after five minutes ; 

 about the eighth minute it stretched itself out, and expired 

 at the tenth. It remained relaxed and extended after the 

 cessation of the vital functions ; and its musrcles were re- 

 laxed, contrary to those of the animal drowned in the colder 

 water. 



The irritability of the heart is inseparably connected with 

 ' respiration. VVheiicver the inhaled gas differs in its pro- 

 perties from the common atmosphere, the muscular and 

 sensible parts of the system exhibit the change ; the actions 

 of the heart are altered or suspended, and the whole mus- 

 cular and sensorial systems partake of the disorder: the 

 temperature of anim.als, as before intimated, seems altoge- 

 ther dependent on the respiratory t'unclions, although it 

 still remains uncertain in what manner this is effected. 



The blood appears to be the medium of conveying heat 

 to the different parts of the body; and the changes of ani- 

 mal temperature in the same individual at various times, or 

 in its several parts, are always connected wi'h the degree of 

 rapidity of the circulation. It is no very wide stretch of 

 physiological deduction to infer, that this increased tempe- 

 rature is produced by the more frequent exposure of the 

 mass ©f blood to the respiratory influence, nnd the short 

 time allowed in each circuit for the loss of the acquired 

 heat. 



The blood of an animal is usually coagulated immediately 

 after death, and the muscles are contiacted; but in son)e 

 peculiar modes of death, neither the one nor the other of 

 the^e effects is produced : with such exceptions, the two 

 pha:noniena are concomitant. 



A preternatural increase of animal heat delays the coagu- 

 lation of the blood, and the last contractions of the mus- 

 cles : these contractions gradually disappear before any 

 changes troni putrefaction are manifested ; but the cup in 

 the coagulum of blood does not relax in the same manner; 

 hence it may be inferred that the final contraction of mus- 

 cles is not the coagulation of the blood contained in them ; 

 neither is it a change in the reticular membrane, nor in the 

 blood-vessels, because such contractions arc not general 

 thrQughout those iubstances. The coagulation of the blood 



is 



