230 THE PITUITARY, THYROID AND ADRENALS AS A SYSTEM. 



while the functions of the adrenals gradually ceased after their 

 isolation from the bulbo-spinal centers, cardio-vascular action 

 could be very actively maintained by injections of suprarenal 

 extract: a result which, as shown by the experiments of le 

 Gallois, Goltz, Strieker, and Ustimowitch, could not be reached 

 by other means. 



The all-important direct action of the suprarenal secretion 

 on the heart was then introduced to further strengthen the 

 relationship between the anterior pituitary and the adrenals, 

 previously found to exist through the intermediary of sympa- 

 thetic structures. The function of the anterior pituitary body 

 then affirmed itself, since the active symptoms of digitalis were 

 found to include not only phenomena directly assignable to 

 inordinate suprarenal secretion, but others which experimental 

 physiology including the experiments quoted herein had 

 ascribed to bulbar influence. To finally confirm all these facts, 

 a chronic disease, previously shown to be due to excessive stim- 

 ulation of the anterior pituitary body, was compared symptom- 

 atically with acute digitalis poisoning, to ascertain whether two 

 conditions, so remote pathogenically according to our present 

 knowledge, could also show signs of kinship. We have seen 

 that even this severe test did not fail to point to a common 

 origin, the anterior pituitary body, for many of the cardinal 

 phenomena witnessed in both. 



If to all this we now add the results of de Cyon's experi- 

 ments in horses, dogs, rabbits, and guinea-pigs, in which he 

 noted that the least pressure upon or electrical stimulation of 

 the pituitary caused sudden variations of vascular pressure and 

 of cardiac action precisely coinciding with the effects now so 

 often shown in this work to be those of suprarenal overactivity, 

 and also the fact that acromegaly, essentially a disease of the 

 anterior pituitary body, likewise presents this kinship with the 

 adrenals, including the "erethic" and "cachectic" stages, and 

 various vasomotor phenomena, the following deductions seem 

 warranted: 



1. The thyroid gland supplies the Hood with a secretion which 

 has for its object to sustain the functional activity of the anterior 

 pituitary body. 



2. The anterior pituitary body is directly connected with the 



