Microscopic Examination of Blood. 317 



tion of a coloured corpuscle, and it is quite probable that it 

 was such a bod3^ Eight were found whose size was btsbu of 

 an inch, or about 5,a. 



Number and HcBinoglohin. — A careful enumeration of the 

 coloured corpuscles was first made March 4th, counting the 

 corpuscles in fifty squares. This resulted in 4,132,000 per 

 cubic millimeter, or about 80 per cent. The estimation of 

 haemoglobin at the same time resulted in finding 40 per cent. 

 Another enumeration made March 7th, counting one hundred 

 squares, gave 4,188,000 per cubic millimeter, or about 80 per 

 cent. The estimation of hcemoglobin at the same time gave 

 40 per cent. The number of coloured corpuscles then was 

 about 80 per cent., and the haemoglobin 40 per cent, of the 

 normal number and quantity. 



Shape. — In certain blood diseases many of the coloured 

 corpuscles are very irregular in outline, assuming very peculiar 

 shapes; not amoeboid, but quite constant for any particular 

 corpuscle. To these queer coloured corpuscles the term 

 poikilocytes is applied. The writer looked long and carefully 

 for poikilocytes, but not more than a dozen rewarded his 

 search. The few irregular cells that were seen were shaped 

 somewhat like Rupert's drops with short tails. One peculiar 

 corpuscle was cigar-shaped, 5,a long and i/z wide. A striking 

 peculiarity was the absence of crenated forms. After making 

 a number of examinations, none of the slides showed a single 

 crenated corpuscle. One slide was kept one and one-half 

 hours. At the expiration of that time the coloured corpuscles 

 moved freely in the plasma when the slide was tipped, but 

 none of the corpuscles were crenated. 



Rouleaux. — In every examination of the blood by itself, with- 

 out the addition of an}- reagent, rouleaux were formed as in 

 normal blood. In one field two stationary leucocytes were so 

 situated that when currents of plasma carrying coloured cor- 

 puscles flowed between them, the coloured cells were com- 

 pelled not only to pass through in single file, but to squeeze 



