THE BLOOD. 127 



abundant in adults than in children. When an animal is 

 bled, and thus deprived of a large quantity of fibrine, it is 

 easily ascertained that the fibrine is reproduced shortly after- 

 wards. Thus it does not come from outside : it is formed in 

 the organism, and examination of the circumstances under 

 which it increases proves that it constitutes an organic waste 

 which gives rise by its decomposition to the urea and to uric 

 acid : these elements, in fact, appear in the urine after inflam- 

 mations in which there has been an excess of fibrine in the 

 blood. 



The experiments of Brown-Sequard show that in the phys- 

 iological condition fibrine is produced, above all, in the 

 muscles, and that the blood which comes from a muscle is 

 richer in fibrine the more the muscle has been exercised, as, 

 for instance, when under the influence of galvanism. Fibrine 

 is, then, an excrementitious form of the products of nutrition 

 of the tissues, being found in greater abundance when the 

 tissue has received more nutrition. It is difficult to decide 

 where the fibrine disappears or is destroyed. It has been 

 supposed that there is no fibrine in the blood which comes 

 from the liver. This is, however, an error. The blood or 

 the liver is as rich in fibrine as that of the spleen or the 

 muscles, and it only appears to be without it when, in dissec- 

 tion, the bile is allowed to mix with the blood drawn from 

 this organ (Vulpian). Too severe labor, or organic combus- 

 tion, always produces an excess of fibrine in the blood ; in 

 all inflammation there is hyperinosis / this hyperinosis is 

 entirely secondary, and not at all the cause of the state of 

 fever or inflammation. In effusions no fibrine is found, unless 

 the neighboring tissues are in a state of inflammation capable 

 of giving rise to an excess of this organic waste : thus, the 

 liquid of hydrothorax contains no fibrine ; that of pleurisy, 

 on the contrary, a great deal, etc. 



The liquid which remains after the coagulation of the 

 fibrine is called the serum. It contains, as we have already 

 said, a large proportion of albumen (between 70 and 75 

 grammes to 1000 parts) which does not coagulate sponta- 

 neously. The serum finds its way easily out of the vessels 

 either by osmosis, or more frequently by simple transudation, 

 because in cases of stoppage of the blood by a ligature or by 

 compression it has been observed that the albumen abun- 

 dantly transudes. It is generally supposed that the object 

 of the normal transudation of the albumen is the nutrition 

 of the tissues ; this, however, is by no means certain ; and. 



