SMALL INTESTINE 253 



the ferment of the albuminoid substances, while the third, 

 which resembles ptyaline, is precipitated like this latter by con- 

 centrated alcohol, and acts upon the amylaceous substances. 

 As these three active principles can be isolated, and act inde- 

 pendently of each other, it appears, from what we have said, 

 that the spleen has influence over the ferment of the albu- 

 minoids only, and that, moreover, the quantity and tho action 

 of the two other ferments increases in direct proportion to the 

 diminution of the first. At least, the facts related by Vulpian 

 appear to show this. " Is there," he asks, u any increase in 

 the action of the pancreatic juice on the fatty substances, 

 or are the results which I shall quote from Schiff caused solely 

 by the greater activity of the gastric digestion ? It is true 

 that Stinstra admits (in a thesis drawn up under the direction 

 of Van Deen) that there is a larger deposit of fat in all parts 

 of the body in animals whose spleen has been removed; 

 moreover, according to Schmidt, the farmers in some parts 

 of England have a custom of extirpating the spleen of calves, 

 in order to fatten them more rapidly." 



II. Movements of the Intestine. The food, having been 

 thus modified by the enteric and the pancreatic juices, then 

 passes through the small intestine by means of its peristal- 

 tic movements. 1 In the normal condition these movements 

 are always slow and feeble ; but, if they become exagger- 

 ated, pains known as colicky are produced. These contrac- 

 tions are reflex, and are increased chiefly in pathological 

 cases : thus the eifect of some purgatives is to increase these 

 movements ; this is the case with oils and vegetable matters 

 generally. Saline purgatives, on the other hand, act chiefly 

 by causing hypersecretion of the glands of Lieberkiihn, and 

 give rise to serous diarrhoea, without colic. If the body of 

 a man who has died in good health and during digestion be 

 examined, there will be found, at short distances in the intes- 

 tinal tube, waves of alimentary matter, associated with red 

 patches upon the mucous coat, which is colorless between these 

 points. This state of congestion corresponds with the more 

 active secretion that takes place at these points ; the pan- 

 creas also is highly congested during secretion. 



The alimentary substances seem to pass rapidly through 

 the two upper portions of the small intestine (duodenum 



1 See Legros and Onimus, " Recherches Expdrimentales sur 

 les Mouvements de 1'Intestin." (Journal de 1'Anat. et de la 

 Physiol., de Ch. Ilobiii. 1809, No. de Janvier.) 



