86 ACTION OF GLANDS. 



It must, nowever, be acknowledged, that no information which has as yet been 

 obtained respecting the structure of glands, enables us to explain their won- 

 derful effect upon the fluids which pass through them. It remains yet to be 

 ascertained why one structure forms saliva and another bile ; or why so 

 much apparatus should be necessary for the secretion of milk when adipose 

 matter appears to be produced by the mere membrane in which it is 

 contained. 



Dr. Berzelius, professor of Chemistry at Stockholm, in a work on animal 

 chemistry, asserts, that if all the nerves going to a secretory organ are divided, 

 secretion will cease, notwithstanding the continued circulation of the blood. 

 From this, he thinks, that secretions depend upon the influence of nerves, 

 although he cannot explain their effects. 



Mr. Home, after relating some experiments upon blood and serum, made with 

 the Voltaic Battery, proposes the following questions, among others: Whether 

 a weaker power of electricity than any which can be kept up by art, may be 

 capable of separating from the blood the different parts of which it is com- 

 posed ; and forming new combinations of the parts so separated ? Whether 

 the structure of the nerves may enable them to possess a low electrical power, 

 which can be employed for that purpose ? &c. 



See the London Philosophical Transactions, for 1809, part II.* 



* Mr. Wollaston has also published a small paper on this subject, in the Philosophical 

 Magazine, vol. 33. 



