122 THE BLOOD AND ITS CIRCULATION. 



which it excited at its first discovery in the seventeenth 

 century, whence the practice of it was forbidden by the Par- 

 liament of 1668. (Lower, Denis.) To-day, we count by 

 hundreds cases of hemorrhage, where the invalid has been 

 recalled to life by the transfusion of blood, especially in the 

 case of metrorrhagia. In order to produce the desired effect, 

 the blood globules must be taken from an animal of the same 

 kind. Any others would be no more capable of restoring 

 life than the spermatozoids of one would be to propagate the 

 ovula of the other. A very small quantity of blood is suffi- 

 cient to produce this vital change, and to enable the patient 

 to regain the usual quantity, by the process of nutrition. 

 Transfusion has also been applied in cases of poisoning, and 

 is a very proper agent in the case, for instance, of poisoning 

 by oxide of carbon, which causes paralysis of the red glob- 

 ules; it has been found successful (Rouget), the useless 

 globules being replaced by new ones and so capable of their 

 nutritive and respiratory functions. In other kinds of poison- 

 ing and in the uremia, this method does not succeed as well. 



The red globules are thus what may be called the organ 

 of the blood. When they increase disproportionately, a 

 kind of plethora ensues, circulation is impeded, and conges- 

 tion is likely to follow. Something analogous to this takes 

 place in the cholera, but by an entirely different method ; 

 there the immense waste of liquids by the intestines renders 

 the blood extremely thick ; the globules uniting, make the 

 blood gluey. In all chronic, and in most acute diseases, where 

 a strict regimen has been long observed, a sensible diminution 

 takes place in the organ of the blood (see p. 112), corre- 

 sponding with the length of the malady. It attains its height 

 in anaemia and in chlorosis, and cases of chlorosis have been 

 known in which the cruor formed only a quarter of the mass 

 of the blood ; what is called hydrsemia (a corresponding in- 

 crease in the watery part of the blood being understood) 

 then takes place. 



In their own life, the blood globules exhibit different 

 phases of existence ; they undergo changes ; there are young 

 globules, and old globules. The former are, in the adult, 

 produced by the transformation of the colorless (the white) 

 globules of the lymph. 



The transformation of white globules into red, which some 

 histologists consider doubtful is, nevertheless, shown us by 

 many proofs. The first which we shall mention is the direct 

 one furnished by Recklinghausen, and, more recently, by 



