PATHOLOGY. 



139 



RAPID POISONING CONTINUED. 



None of the cases in the table exhibit instances of the greatest possible 

 rapidity of death. Dr. Mitchell has seen a pigeon die within ten seconds from a 

 hypodermatic injection of pure Crotalus venom. In such a case there is positively 

 no lesion, and the blood is solidly coagulated. 



In most cases very soon after injection of the venom in either of its forms, the 

 time varying from a few minutes to a few hours, according to the kind of animal 

 and the quantity of venom used, there appears a swelling at the point of injection 

 with intense violet-black discoloration of the skin, which gradually extends over 

 an area of several square inches. On making an incision into the tissues in the 

 immediate neighborhood of the injection, they are found to be soaked with 

 extravasated blood. This is often all that is visible if death has occurred soon; 

 but if it has been postponed for a short time, then in tissues distant from the place 

 of the injection, extravasations to a smaller extent were often found. Most pro- 

 nounced and most frequent are the ecchymoses below serous membranes (subpleural, 

 subperitoneal, and subpericardial) ; in fact the whole organism is deeply affected, 

 the tissues being congested and presenting a much darker appearance than normal. 

 The blood does not seem to coagulate readily within cavities or interstices of the 

 body unless death follmcs almost instantaneously. In cases which live longer, the 

 blood remains commonly in a liquid state, or coagulates imperfectly, and then only 

 after being exposed to the air, resembling in this particular the state of that fluid 

 observed in conditions of asphyxia. 



