CHAP. XXVI.] PROOF OF LYMPHATIC ABSORPTION. 279 



of morbid materials in the current of the lymph, exciting inflam- 

 mation in successive parts as it comes into contact with them ; 

 and the severe constitutional disturbance usually attendant on this 

 state of lymphatic inflammation is attributable, with a high degree 

 of probability, to a discharge of some such morbid fluid conta- 

 minating the lymph into the blood-vessels, so as to mingle with 

 the general circulating mass of blood. Wagner mentions that the 

 axillary glands of a subject brought for dissection were found of an 

 intense red colour from the deposition of cinnabar in their texture, 

 while on the arm was a red tattooed figure of old date, which had 

 evidently furnished the material.* 



That the blood vessels also absorb, however, is rendered certain, 

 not merely by considering that their structure and physical con- 

 ditions furnish every element requisite for this function, but by 

 experiments of a conclusive nature. Panizza poisoned a horse, by 

 confining hydrocyanic acid in a loop of intestine, which was 

 separated from the body excepting by one artery and vein which 

 maintained the circulation in it. As long as the vein was com- 

 pressed the animal escaped, but when the pressure was remitted the 

 poison took effect ; and in blood drawn from the vein the acid was 

 detected. 



Contents of the Absorbents. The lymphatics (and the lacteals 

 when digestion is not going on) contain a nearly colourless and 

 transparent fluid, termed lymph, in which are included a number 

 of colourless nucleated cells of globular shape (lymph corpuscles, 

 colourless corpuscles] analogous to, and even identical with, the 

 colourless corpuscles of the blood. The lacteals during the diges- 

 tion of fatty matters always contain another element which gives 

 a milky hue to the chyle, viz., a finely granular matter, termed by 

 Mr. Gulliver the molecular base. 



Lymph and chyle, when withdrawn from their vessels, sponta- 

 neously coagulate into a slightly coherent jelly in the course of a 

 few minutes. This property depends on the presence of fibrine 

 in a fluid form, as in the blood, and varies with the point from 

 which the lymph is drawn, as well as with the activity of the 

 nutritive vigour in the animal at the time. The clot at first 

 entangles the floating particles, and if the fibrine have sufficient 

 energy, it undergoes some degree of subsequent contraction, by 

 which a loose mesh is separated from the fluid part, as the crassa- 

 mentum from the serum of the blood. Most of the corpuscles 

 usually remain in the clot, though some escape and remain with 

 * Physiology, by Willis, p. 440. 



