Memoir on aeriform cvlaneons Verspiralion. 359 



Ingcnhousz, bpth on himself and on several individuals of 

 difierent ages, employing different kinds of water, the tem- 

 perature of which he varied, and asserts that he never ob- 

 served the least aeriform emanation. Presuming that the 

 water, according to its gravity, might impede the escape of 

 the air, or that it might crisp the exhaling vessels of the 

 skin, he continued his researches, varying the processes 

 emploved by Dr. Priestley and M. Fontanaj and lie thinks 

 he has proved by experiments, the inexactness of which 

 might l)e easily shown, that a small quantity of fixed air 

 (carbonic acid gas) is continually escaping through the skin. 

 Fourcroy on this subject expresses himself as follows : 

 *' It is not true that elastic fluids, and particularly carbonic 

 acid gas, escape througji the skin, as some of the moderns 

 have asserted *. 



Such, a few years ago, was the state of the question 

 which forms the subject of this article. Incorrect experi- 

 ments, the contradictory results of \\ hich were contested 

 either in the whole or in part, left philosophers in uncer- 

 tainty, and seemed to call for new researches, in order to 

 fix the opinion of philosophers on this point. 



I often reflected on it, and had formed a design of em- 

 loying myself with it, when in the spring of the year 6, 

 eing near one of my patients who was in the bath, I per- 

 ceived that he was entirely covered with small bubbles of 

 air. The hairs on his body were surrounded by bubbles 

 decreasing from the base to the summit, so that a great 

 punibcr of them exhibited the appearance of pyramids more, 

 or less elevated. I made all these bubbles disappear ; but in 

 the course of half an hour thej' were succeeded by an equal 

 number. In consequence of observing this phaenomenon, 

 I caused my patient to continue his bathing ; and having 

 collected several bell-fulls of this gas, I examined it care- 

 fully several times, and found that it was azotic gas, per- 

 fectly pure, without any mixture of carbonic acid. 



I was then desirous to know whether this phaenomenon 

 was general, or whether it depended on the pathological 

 state of the subject. I made experiments on myself, and 

 on several other individuals, but never observed any thing 

 of the kind. 



In the beginning of the vcar 9 I communicated my ex- 

 periments, and the result of them, to C-. Fourcroy, who re- 

 tjiiesled that I would continue them. Encouraged by the 



• Byittiiic dcs Cotuioi!.ianccs C!;i;!!iqucs, torn. is. p. 203. 



approbation 



I 



