42 THE PHYSIOLOGY OF THE ADRENALS. 



cation of the relationship between the effects of carbolic-acid 

 poisoning and disturbed suprarenal functions is the reference 

 to the fact that in frogs and mammals "the paralyzing influ- 

 ences of carbolic acid are usually first manifested upon the 

 hind-legs." . . . Chloral is referred to as producing mus- 

 cular weakness and then paralysis. Labbee is stated to have 

 found that after death the muscles respond perfectly to gal- 

 vanism, thus eliminating organic alteration of the muscular 

 tissues as a factor in the paralytic phenomena. 



The muscular relaxation witnessed in chloroform anes- 

 thesia needs only to be recalled. Cocaine is termed by Wood 

 "a muscle-poison, stimulating and afterward depressing the 

 functional activity." Copper is referred to as capable of caus- 

 ing progressive paralysis. Bokay 90 found that the muscles were 

 affected very early by continuous doses, "cloudiness of their 

 protoplasm and disappearance of their cross-striation coming 

 on." This recalls the cloudy swelling previously referred to as 

 observed even in the adrenals themselves, the precursor of fatty 

 degeneration. Digitalis in toxic doses is said to cause lassitude, 

 prostration, and muscular tremors. Ether anaesthesia, and the 

 profound muscular relaxation produced, need only be men- 

 tioned. Hydrocyanic acid is termed a "paralyzant to the mus- 

 cles," general paralysis ensuing almost immediately after taking 

 a toxic dose. That the hind-extremities are first paralyzed in 

 animals we have ascertained. The effects of mercury in this 

 connection are well known, "mercurial palsy," which occurs 

 within a few hours after the poison enters the organism; the 

 "peculiar brownish hue of the whole body" . . . "which 

 generally accompanies the disease," are easily accounted for 

 with suprarenal insufficiency as an element of the process. 



Opium was found as long ago as 1826 by Charvet 91 to 

 cause "progressive loss of power in the contractile tissue, end- 

 ing in death; in fishes, paralysis and convulsions; in birds and 

 mammals, paralysis, convulsions, and stupor." Interesting in 

 this connection is the observation credited to Albers 92 that 

 "convulsive movements occur in limbs after section of their 



Bfikay: Pester med.-chir. Presse, 33, 1897. 



91 Charvet: Perelra's "Materia Medica," 1035; Philadelphia, 1854. 



2 Albers: Virchow's Archiv, xxvi, 229. 



