82 THE PROTEOMORPHIC THEORY AND THE NEW MEDICINE 



acter of the physiological action that leads to the destruction 

 of the red corpuscle, but this would carry us too far afield. 



Conceivably osmotic pressure alone may suffice ; the substance 

 of the hemoglobin being in part decompounded by the imbibed 

 foreign enzymes, and its osmotic pressure thus enhanced. Rup- 

 ture would then be likely to take place in the liver, because that 

 organ serves as a great lagoon in which blood from the portal 

 vein becomes relatively static, and reduced in pressure. Some- 

 what similar conditions in this regard obtain, it may be added, 

 in the spleen ; and it is perhaps significant that many physiologists 

 believe that this organ also is the seat of erythrocytolysis. 



In any event, through osmotic or chemical action disruption 

 does occur, and the unassimilable remnant of the foreign proteid 

 is thus extruded into the intestine, whence it originally came; 

 the general protein content of the red corpuscle (transformed 

 now through partial disruption into globulin and albumin) being 

 liberated to contribute to the regular protein contents of the blood 

 serum. 



It requires but the most casual study of corpuscles in the Tois- 

 son solution in the counting chamber to suggest the widely differ- 

 ing conditions of osmotic pressure among the corpuscles of a 

 drop of blood, and the diversified conditions that obtain in asso- 

 ciation with various toxaemias. In freshly drawn supposedly 

 normal blood all the erythrocytes will appear smooth in contour, 

 the cell-membrane seemingly taut. But in the course of half 

 an hour or so the appearance of most of the corpuscles may be 

 utterly changed. They become shriveled, and assume the appear- 

 ance of diminutive sea urchins. Modifications of size and con- 

 tour continue, presumably, until the contents of the cell become 

 isotonic with the saline medium. 



It is my belief that valuable inferences may be drawn as to the 

 physiological and pathological activities of the corpuscles, in 

 individual cases, from study of the variable time and character 

 of modification undergone by the corpuscles in thus reaching a 

 state of osmotic equilibrium. 



For example, cells that shrivel in a medium of moderate hyper- 

 tonicity may be assumed to have a large-moleculed content. And 

 this gives presumptive evidence that the functions of completing 

 hydrolysis of absorbed peptones or polypeptids is being per- 

 formed sluggishly or inadequately. In such a case compensation 

 may for a time be effected by increase of red corpuscles, and we 

 are confronted with the clinical paradox of a virtual ansemia in 

 which the number of erythrocytes is perhaps five and a half or - 

 six million. 



If in such a case the white corpuscles appear fairly normal in 

 number, quality, and differential count, it may be inferred that 



