52 THE PHYSIOLOGY OP THE ADRENALS. 



may rise slightly: an effort of the adrenals to abnormal activity 

 before insufficiency prevails. Alcohol, a cardiac stimulant, was 

 found by Ruge 108 to lower the temperature 3 C. when given 

 in sufficient quantity to animals to produce narcosis, while a 

 lethal dose reduced it 5 C. The flushed face of the drunkard 

 betokens adrenal overactivity with contraction of the abdom- 

 inal vascular trunks and congested capillaries, while the pallor 

 of the advanced stage typifies the contrary condition. Anti- 

 mony is also stated to perceptibly reduce animal heat. Wood 

 refers to the observation of Ackermann, who observed a fall 

 of 6.6 C. in rabbits that lived five hours. In fact, the term 

 "cardiac depressant" points to insufficiency of the adrenals. 

 Insufficiently supplied with its normal tone-giving element, the 

 suprarenal secretion, the heart is arrested in diastole. Anti- 

 pyrin likewise gives rise to a fall of bodily temperature, but 

 we have here a set of symptoms which emphasize the presence 

 of further advanced suprarenal insufficiency: an eruption fol- 

 lowed by a brown pigmentation. Bullae, which recall those 

 previously referred to as observed in children whose adrenals 

 were found heemorrhagic post-mortem, also follow the use of 

 this drug in some cases. 



Arsenic poisoning has already been referred to as simulat- 

 ing cholera, for which, according to Wood, it has not only been 

 mistaken "during life, but also on the post-mortem table." 

 It is the intense suprarenal insufficiency, similar in degree, 

 brought on by arsenic as well as by the cholera toxin, that 

 gives rise to the phenomena witnessed, among which is "icy 

 coldness." Belladonna, with its alkaloid atropine, affords a 

 good example of the antagonistic effects that always prevail. 

 Stimulated to great activity by this drug, the central vascular 

 trunks are contracted and the surface capillaries engorged at 

 first. But, while a marked increase may be caused by large 

 doses, as is well known, poisonous doses will bring it down 

 below normal. In animals this reduction has reached 5.1 

 C. The bromides in toxic doses, to use Wood's words, "lower 

 very decidedly the temperature." We have typified in the 

 effects of these agents continued insufficiency of adrenals, just 



Ruge: Virchow's Archiv, xlix, 265. 



