288 DIGESTION. 



The circumstance that has been just mentioned leads us to a 

 most important question in connexion with the general process of 

 digestion. We have pointed out in the introductory remarks to this 

 section, that very little light has yet been thrown upon the manner in 

 which those substances are resorbed which are known to pass, as pro- 

 ducts of digestion, into the blood. In order to obtain an insight into 

 this obscure subject, it seemed advisable to commence the investi- 

 gation with the simplest and least complicated part of the inquiry, 

 namely, with the determination of the laws affecting the resorption 

 of sugar. The following means were employed to determine this 

 point. Solutions of grape-sugar, of various but accurately deter- 

 mined strengths, were introduced into tied loops of gut of different 

 lengths, and the animal being killed after 1, 2, 3, or 4 hours, 

 both the quantity of sugar remaining in the loops of gut and the 

 quantity contained in the blood were determined. The following 

 may be regarded as the most interesting of the results which 

 von Becker obtained from this series of experiments, which 

 amounted to nearly 60 in number : the quantity of the absorbed 

 sugar is altogether independent of the length of the loop of gut or 

 of the superficial extent of the absorbing surface. This thoroughly 

 unexpected result was confirmed in all the experiments ; the 

 quantity of sugar injected into the loop being the same, the 

 resorption remained the same, however large the portion of intes- 

 tine over which the solution of sugar was distributed ; if, however, 

 a very short loop were taken, the rule would not hold good. Thus, 

 for instance, 8 grammes of a saccharine solution, containing 0*278 

 of a gramme of sugar in 7' 722 grammes of water, were injected 

 into tied loops of intestine in two rabbits of equal size ; in one of 

 the animals the cubic contents of the tied gut amounted to 27,720 

 cubic millemetres [about 1*6 cubic inches], and in the other to 

 only 6,800 cubic millemetres 0*4 of a cubic inch] ; and yet, after 

 four hours 3 only 0*231 of a gramme of sugar was resorbed from 

 the former, while 0*225 of a gramme (or very nearly the same 

 quantity) w r as taken up from the latter. In several experiments it 

 was actually found that rather more sugar was resorbed from the 

 smaller than from the larger loop. 



A second fact which von Becker established by parallel 

 experiments with tw r o rabbits of similar size, was equally un- 

 expected. While there is a general tendency to believe that the 

 resorption of the intestinal contents proceeds with a rapidity and 

 freedom proportional in a certain degree to the dilution of the 

 solutions contained in the intestine, he found that, at all events, 



