TREATMENT. 121 



for the present urge their disposal at this time as a matter 

 of personal convenience; and witli this apology we may be 

 permitted to announce a summary view of the uses of Oxalic 

 and Acetic Acids in the treatment of the Pest. 



Oxalic Acid is known to exist in vegetables eaten by man, 

 as in the Ehubarb plant {Rheum r1iaponticum)y and in the 

 Tomato {Lijcopersicum esculentum.) 



It obtains also in vegetable food consumed by cattle, of 

 which we will only specify the sorrel tribe, either the mount- 

 ain variety, oxyria reniformis (R. Digynus, L.), or the com- 

 mon Dock {Rumex acetosa), and the equally common sagittate 

 plant. According to Liebig,* it exists in roots, barks and 

 leaves to which cattle are frequently found to turn, leaving, 

 when opportunity offers, their richer pastures for such relishes. 

 True, the acid is found in nature mostly in combination with 

 potash and lime. As produced by art, however, it is the only 

 vegetable product which in its anhydrous form contains no 

 hy<lrogen, and thus as the analogue of Carbonic Acid, de- 

 serves a careful study. The experiments made on animals 

 by Ohristison and others, mostly by injections into the veins, 

 exhibit its immediate control over the motor nerves evinced 

 in walking with a peculiar stiff gait, in jerking or drooping of 

 the head, and paroxysmal action of the muscles of the chest. 

 The bright scarlet spots, observed by Smart, are brought 

 put on the external surface of the lungs, unless death has 

 been very rapid. Though no reliable deduction can be made? 

 from these injections into the venous trunks, whether femo* 

 ral or jugular ; yet the post mortem appearance in men, who 

 have been poisoned with this acid taken into the stomach, 

 show the same reddened (sometimes brownish red) appear- 

 ances of the mouth, gullet and windpipe (stomach in parts 

 black, in parts red), duodenum and jejunum ; with easy detach- 

 ment of the epithelium and villous coat, as in the Pest. The 

 high affinity this acid has for lime and potash might justify 

 its use, as a chemico-physiological experiment, at the period 

 when there was reason to believe that the bases of these 

 salts were passing off in the general disintegration of the 



* Animal Chemistry, p. 58. 



16 



