186 MUSCULAR CURRENT. LiECT. IX. 



or belong to animals that have been well fed, the muscular 

 current shows more intensity, and continues for a longer 

 period. 



I have especially experimented upon frogs, because these 

 animals are more capable of resisting the sufferings to which 

 they are subjected, in these researches, than other animals. 



If the muscles of which the pile is composed belong to 

 frogs that have been submitted for a long time to a very low 

 temperature, namely, to centig. [ = 32 Fahr.], or even 

 above 0, the current will be found to be very feeble. In 

 warm-blooded animals, the difference occasioned by a re- 

 duced temperature is less perceptible than in ' frogs. One 

 result may perhaps at first surprise you. It is that the 

 muscular current has the same intensity whether the pile be 

 constructed of single demi-thighs of frogs, or of the same 

 number of elements, each of which consists of two or more 

 demi-thighs laid one on the other. In other words, the 

 superficies of the elements has no influence on the intensity 

 of the current. The same happens with piles formed of 

 conductors of the second class, namely, with acid and alka- 

 line solutions, which react on one another. 



Influence of Poisons, fyc. I wished to see whether the 

 action of poisons had any effect on the intensity and dura- 

 tion of the muscular current; and I found that the intensity 

 of a current obtained from frogs poisoned by carbonic acid, 

 hydrocyanic acid, and arseniuretted hydrogen, did not differ 

 from that furnished by unpoisoned animals. 



The influence of sulphuretted hydrogen on the intensity 

 of the current, is, on the contrary, very marked; a fact 

 which I have verified several times, both upon frogs and 

 pigeons asphyxied and killed in this gas. A dead animal, 

 in an atmosphere of sulphuretted hydrogen, almost entirely 

 loses the property of manifesting the existence of the mus- 

 cular current. 



