86 RINDERPEST. 



chlorides leave the serum at a stage in the Pest correspond- 

 ing to that when they move in cholera ; but whether at this 

 time or at this stage in the process the bases of soda and 

 potash go also or remain a little longer in the circulation, 

 so that a disengagement of chlorine takes place in the blood, 

 and is carried to the lungs in greater or less quantities, 

 producing the partial asphyxia in the Pest commonly as 

 before (p. 67) ascribed to nervous irritation, or that more 

 general suspension of the aerating action of the lungs occur- 

 ring in the algid state of cholera ; it may not be wholly 

 pertinent or appropriate in us to inquire. We may venture 

 at least upon such themes when we come to the therapeutical 

 part of our lab'or. 



Stopping only to draw the attention of the scientific 

 reader to the similarity in form, of the crystals produced 

 by the changes in the saline constituents of the blood, 

 effecting in their singular escapade from the vascular system, 

 new combinations on the surface of the tissues ; we ask the ex- 

 pert in such microscopic crystallography, to say whether the 

 cubical crystals Gamgee observed* are the same as those seent 

 by Perigoif ; and then we would invite the attention of the 

 Chemico-Physiologist to their true substance and composition : 

 and if truly ammoniated phosphate of magnesium, to explain 

 by what process, and in which of the series of saline degen- 

 eration as just stated, they are formed. 



But let us bring this extended pathological summary to 

 a close ; and claim, without any further attempt to sub- 

 stantiate the thesis ; that it is necessary, in order to em- 

 brace the various cases set forth in our earlier tracings 

 of symptoms and morbid anatomy, and to bring unity out of 

 their apparent diversity, to propound the following classifica- 

 tion for the main varieties or stages of the Pest. 



1. The Congestive or Catarrhal Stage^ presenting the dis- 

 ease in its simple and uncomplicated forms, where the lesions 

 do not extend deeper than the epithelial coat of the mucous 

 membrane wherever affected. 



 Page 62, PI. X, flg8. 8, 6 and 6. t Page 88, note on flgi. 10 and 11. 



