530 ABSOEPTKXfr. 



ered pretty fully the composition and properties of the 

 lymph as well as the different principles taken up by the 

 lacteal vessels which, with the lymph, form the chyle. 

 Some general considerations, however, remain concerning 

 the composition and properties of the chyle- as a distinct 

 fluid. 



In the human subject and in carnivorous animals, the 

 chyle taken from the lacteals near the intestine, where it is 

 nearly pure, or from the thoracic duct, when it is mixed with 

 lymph, is a white, opaque, milky fluid, of a slightly saline 

 taste, and an odor which is said to resemble that of the semen. 

 The odor is also said to be characteristic of the animal from 

 which the fluid is taken ; although this is not very marked, 

 except on the addition of concentrated acid, the process^ em- 

 ployed by Barreul to develop the characteristic odor in the 

 fluids from different animals. 1 Bouisson has found that the 

 peculiar odor of the dog was thus developed in fresh chyle 

 taken from the thoracic duct of this animal. 2 



The chyle taken from a fistula into the thoracic duct is 

 frequently of a more or less rosy tint ; and it has been a 

 question whether this be due to a peculiar coloring matter or 

 to the accidental presence of a few red blood-corpuscles. 

 Colin, whose experiments in collecting chyle from living 

 animals have been very numerous and successful, assumes 

 that the red coloration is always due to blood-corpnscles 

 coming from the subclavian vein ; the valve at the orifice of 

 the thoracic duct not being always sufficient to prevent re- 

 gurgitation. He has never found blood in the fluid taken 

 from the mesenteric vessels or the receptaculum chyli. and he 

 states, furthermore, that the chyle from these vessels never 

 becomes colored under the influence of the air or of oxygen. 3 



1 See vol. i., p. 67. 



2 BOUISSON, Eludes sur le Chyle. Gazette Hedicale de Paris, 1844, tome xii., 

 p. 412. 



3 COLIN, Traile de Physiologic Comparee des Animaux Domestiques, Paris, 

 1856, tome ii., p. 7. 



