[ 285 ] 



* 



SECT. XXXII. 



OF THE SECRETIONS IN GENERAL. 



466. Besides the nutritious fluids, others of various 

 iescriptions are produced from the blood by means of 

 ;ecretion, which Haller, no less than his predecessors, 

 .vith truth and regret declared to be among the most 

 >bscure parts of physiology.* 



467. The secreted fluids differ, on the one hand, so 

 considerably among themselves, and, on the other, have 

 jo many points of resemblance, that their classification 

 • ;annot but be extremely arbitrary. If we arrange them 



iccording to the degree of difference between them and 

 he blood from which they are formed, they will stand 

 n the following order. — 



First, the milk, which may be in some degree consi- 

 lered as chyle reproduced, and appears formed by the 

 nost simple process from the blood newly supplied 

 vith chyle. 



Next, the aqueous fluids, as they are commonly deno- 

 ! ainated from their limpid tenuity, although the greater 

 >art differ importantly from water in the nature of their 

 ;onstituents, and especially in the proportion of albu- 

 nen : such are the humours of the eye, the tears, in all 

 )robability the vapour contained in the cellular inter- 

 ;tices and the cavities of the abdomen and thorax ; 



* v. Fouquet on Secretion, in the Encyclopedical Dictionary of Paris. T. xiv. 

 Fr. L. Krevsig, De secretionibus. Spec. i. ii. Lips. 1794 sq. 4to. 



