ABNORMAL CONSTITUENTS. 253 



the blood of oxen, C. Schmidt found from 0'0069 p.m. to 0'0074 

 p.m. of fermentable sugar ; in tKe blood of a dog 0'015 p.m. ; and 

 in that of a cat 0'021 p.m. In the serum of portal blood, in the 

 few cases in which I obtained enough to enable me to detect sugar, I 

 found from 0'0038, to 0-0052 p.m., and in the blood of the hepatic 

 veins, from 0'041 to 0'059 p.m. ; in the blood of diabetic patients, 

 where its existence had often been demonstrated, I never could find 

 more than 0'047 p.m. of sugar. 



We have already noticed (in vol. i., page 217) the quantities in 

 which, according to Garrod, uric acid occurs in normal and morbid 

 blood. 



The amount of urea in the blood has not yet been quantitatively 

 determined; if, however, as has been maintained, urea can be 

 detected in four ounces of healthy blood (see vol. i., page 165) its 

 quantity could certainly be easily determined in morbid blood ; but 

 this is not the case. 



Silica was first discovered by Henneberg in the blood of hens, 

 and was determined quantitatively by Millon (see vol. i., p. 427). 



We have already (in vol. i., page 453), alluded to the occur- 

 rence of carbonate of ammonia in morbid blood; its quantitative 

 determination is impracticable. We would merely add that it has 

 recently been also found in the blood of cholera patients both by 

 C. Schmidt and by myself. While I could detect urea in the blood 

 of such cholera patients as succumbed before the occurrence of the 

 group of symptoms to which we apply the term uraemia, I always 

 found the blood ammoniacal, and the gastric mucous membrane in 

 the dead body strongly alkaline as soon as the cerebral symptoms 

 peculiar to uraemia had once set in. Moreover, from the analogous 

 experiments which I have instituted with the blood in Bright's 

 disease and scarlatina, I might have been led to the conclusion, 

 that it is not the presence of urea, but of ammonia, in the blood, 

 which occasions the symptoms of ureemia ; this view is further 

 supported by the experiments of Bernard arid Barreswil,* who 

 observed that the deleterious consequences of extirpation of the 

 kidneys did not ensue in the dogs on which they operated, until 

 the gastric juice was secreted with an alkaline reaction. 



I have just become acquainted with the interesting experiments 



of Stannius.f who found that after extirpation of the kidneys, 



and even after the simultaneous injection of urea, urea itself could 



never be found in the secretions, or, at all events, in the gastric or 



intestinal juice or in the bile, but was detected in the sero- 



* Arch. gen. de M^d. 4 Ser. T. 13, p. 449. 



t Arch. f. phys. Heilk. Bd. 9, S. 201219. 



