40 Notes from the Physiological Laboratory 



mechanical intermingling of food-stuff and digestive 

 fluid, but the continued addition of small amounts 

 of the digestive fluid itself. I have nearly perfected 

 an apparatus which in a large degree obviates the 

 difficulties just cited. 



In it artificial salivary digestions are conducted in 

 a thin tube of fish-bladder, closed at one end, which 

 is, by mechanical means, kept in gentle agitation. 

 The contents of this tube are maintained at the 

 proper temperature by a surrounding body of warm 

 water which is slowly but constantly changed. For 

 gastric digestions the animal membrane is substi- 

 tuted by one offering equally great surface for dial- 

 ysis, but resistant to peptic action. Despite, how- 

 ever, the inaccuracies attending existing methods of 

 study, the following deductions from the facts, old 

 and new, which are here presented, appear justi- 

 fiable. 



I. That the earliest production of free acid 

 within the stomach is approximately three-fourths 

 of an hour after a meal ; its appearance being still 

 futher delayed by the ingestion of food in large 

 quantity. 



II. That hydrobromic acid is liable to impede 

 the digestion of starchy foods when administered 

 with the interval just named ; and, 



