450 ABSOKPTION. 



it is unnecessary to quote in detail, indicate that death must 

 take place after ligation of the thoracic duct, unless there 

 exist some communicating vessel by which the chyle can be 

 discharged into the venous system. We cannot assume, with 

 Lower, that a dog can die of starvation within three days "af- 

 ter this operation ; but it is an inevitable conclusion, from 

 the experiments cited above, that the cause of death is 

 chiefly mechanical, and is due to distension, and sometimes 

 rupture, of some of the vessels. Cooper found that the recep- 

 taculum chyli was ruptured in dogs when the extremity of 

 the duct was exposed soon after eating and simply com- 

 pressed for a few minutes with the fingers. 1 - A permanent 

 loss of the nutritive material which passes up the thoracic 

 duct might produce death from inanition; but usually the 

 fatal result follows too soon to admit of this explanation. 

 Leuret and Lassaigne tied the thoracic duct in a dog, which 

 was treated antiphlogistically after the operation, by M. 

 Watrin, and restored in fifty-eight days in good condition. 

 This animal was afterward killed during digestion, and the 

 abdomen opened. It was ascertained that the duct was sin- 

 gle, and the receptaculum and the lacteals contained a small 

 quantity of chyle. 2 Leuret and Lassaigne reasoned, from 

 this single experiment, that there exists a communication 

 between the lacteals and the radicles of the portal vein. 

 They did not, however, demonstrate by injection that there 

 existed no communication between the lower portion of the 

 duct and the veins of the neck. 



Absorption from Parts not connected with the Digestive 

 System'. Aside from the entrance of gases into the blood 

 from the pulmonary surface, physiological absorption is al- 

 most entirely confined to the mucous membrane of the ali- 

 mentary canal. It is true that liquids may find their way 



1 ASTLEY COOPER, op. a/., p. 110. 



2 LEURET ET LASSAIGNE, Rccherches Physiologiques et Chimiques pour servir 

 d VHistoire de la Digestion, Paris, 1825, p. 180 et seq. 



