WHITE BLOOD-CORPUSCLES. 305 



contain, according to BOTTAZZI and CAPPELLI/ considerably more 

 potassium than sodium. Lime is claimed to be absent in the blood- 

 corpuscles, but according to HAMBURGER 2 this is not true for at least 

 ox-blood, and magnesia occurs only in small amounts: 0.016 (sheep) 

 -0.150 p. m. (pig). The blood-corpuscles of all animals investigated 

 contain chlorine, 0.460-1.949 p. m. (both in horse), generally 1 to 2 

 p. m., and also phosphoric acid. The amount of inorganic phosphoric 

 acid shows great variation: 0.275 (sheep)-1.916 p. m. (horse). All 

 of the above figures are calculated on the fresh, moist blood-corpuscles. 



By quantitative determinations of the swelling and shrinking of the cells 

 under the influence of NaCl solutions of various concentration, or of serum of 

 various dilutions, HAMBURGER has attempted to determine for the erythrocytes, 

 as well as the leucocytes, the percentage relationship between the two chief con- 

 stituents of the cells (the frame and the intracellular fluid). He found that the 

 volume of the frame-substance for both varieties of blood-corpuscles of the horse 

 was equal to 53-56.1 per cent. The volume for the red blood-corpuscles was 

 for the rabbit 48.7-51; hen, 52.4-57.7, and for the frog, 72-76.4 per cent. 

 KOEPPE has raised objections to these determinations. 3 



The White Blood- corpuscles and the Blood-plates. 



The White Blood-corpuscles, also called LEUCOCYTES or Lymphoid 

 Cells, are of different kinds, and ordinarily we differentiate between 

 the small forms poor in protoplasm, called lymphocytes, and the larger, 

 granular, often more nucleated forms, called leucocytes. The poly- 

 nuclear leucocytes occur in greater abundance in the blood than the 

 lymphocytes. In human and mammalian blood, most of the white 

 blood-corpuscles are larger than the red blood-corpuscles. They also 

 have a lower specific gravity than the red corpuscles, move in the circulat- 

 ing blood nearer to the walls of the blood-vessels, and also have a slower 

 motion. 



The number of white blood-corpuscles varies not only in the different 

 blood-vessels, but also under different physiological conditions. On 

 an average there is only 1 white corpuscle for 350-500 red corpuscles. 

 According to the investigations of ALEX. SCHMIDT 4 and his pupils, 

 the leucocytes are destroyed in great part on the discharge of the blood 

 before and during coagulation, so that discharged blood is much poorer 

 in leucocytes than the circulating blood. The correctness of this state- 

 ment has been denied by other investigators. 



1 Bunge, Zeitschr. f. Biologie, 12, and Abderhalden, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 

 23 and 25; Wanach, Maly's Jahresber., 18, 88; Bottazzi and Cappelli, Arch. Ital. 

 de Biologie, 32. 



2 Zeitschr. f. physik. Chem. 69. 



3 Hamburger, Arch. f. (Anat. u ) Physiol., 1898; Koeppe, ibid., 1899 and 1900. 



4 Pfliiger's Arch., 11 and Kruger, Arch. f. exp. Path. u. Pharm., 51. 



