346 SECEETION. 



nary excretion after the other has been removed, and that 

 the single organ remaining probably does not undergo en- 

 largement. 1 



There are certain phenomena that sometimes follow re- 

 moval of the spleen from the lower animals, which are 

 curious and interesting, even if they do not afford much 

 positive information. Extirpation of this organ is an old 

 and a very common experiment. In the works of Malpighi, 

 published in 168T, we find an account of an experiment 

 on a dog, in which the spleen was destroyed, and tho ope- 

 ration was followed by no serious results. 3 Since then it 

 has been removed so often, and the experiments have been so 

 universally negative in their results, that it is hardly neces- 

 sary to cite authorities on the subject. There are numerous 

 instances, also, in which it has been in part or entirely 

 removed from the human subject, which it is unnecessary 

 to refer to in detail ; but in nearly every case, when there was 

 no diseased condition to complicate the observation, the result 

 has been the same as in experiments on the inferior animals. 3 



One of the phenomena to which we desire to call at- 

 tention is the modification of the appetite. Great voracity 

 in animals, after removal of the spleen, was noted by the 



1 See page 170. 



9 MALPIGHI, De Liene, Opera omnia, Lugd. Batav., 1687, tomus ii., p. 302. 



3 In the Union medicate, Paris, 1867, 21me annee, Nos. 141, 142, pp. 340, 

 373, a case of splenotomy followed by complete recovery is reported by M. Pean. 

 In succeeding numbers of the same journal, M. Magdelain has collected reports 

 of nine cases of splenotomy performed on account of wounds of the abdomen, 

 and six cases in which the spleen had been in part or entirely removed on ac- 

 count of disease. In all the cases of injury, the patients recovered, presenting 

 afterward no unusual symptoms ; but of the six cases of disease of the spleen, 

 four of the patients died (II union medicate, Paris, 1867, Nos. 144, 146, pp. 405, 

 431). Other cases of removal of the spleen in the human subject are quoted in the 

 New York Medical Journal, 1868, vol. vii., p. 258, et seg. In HALLER, Elementa 

 Physiologies, Bernse, 1764, p. 421, is a full historical account of the early ex- 

 periments on removal of the spleen in the lower animals ; and Prof. Dunglison 

 (Human Physiology, Philadelphia, 1856, vol. i., p. 583, et seg.) gives an account 

 of experiments on animals, and cites numerous instances of its removal or ab- 

 sence in the human subject. 



