362 



NITRITE OF AMYL IN THE COLLAPSE OF CHOLERA. 



teristic a symptom, have naturally attracted much attention ; 

 and numerous analyses of them have been made by Kiihne * 

 Parkesf and others, with a view to ascertain their nature and 

 probable origin. It has thus been found that Iheir composition 

 is? like that of the intestinal juice, except that they contain a 

 much larger proportion of water than it does. Under ordinary 

 circumstances, the secretion from the mucous membrane of the 

 intestine is never so dilute as the stools of cholera; but a very 

 dilute juice, which is almost identical in composition with the 

 rice-water stools,^ is secreted by the intestine when the nerves 

 going to it are paralysed, as in tlie well-known experiment of 

 Moreau.§ This gentleman took a large dog, which had not been 

 fed for at least twenty-four hours, and, after putting it under 

 chloroform, made an incision through the abdominal walls, and 

 drew out a loop of intestine. Eound this he put two ligatures, 



Fig. J48. — Diagram showing the effect of section of nerves on secretion from 

 the intestine. Tlie nerves going to the middle loop have been divided, and 

 it is distended with the fluid secreted. 



A/ £■/?!/£"? 



about 4 or 5 inches apart from one another, so that the 

 piece of bowel between them was completely tied off from the 

 rest of the intestine ; he then cut all the nerves going to this 



* Kiihne. Paper read before the Medical Society of Amsterdam in the winter 

 of 1868-9. Unpublislied. 



t Partes, London Journal of Medicine, vol. i, p. 13 i. 



X Kiihne, op. cit. 



§ Moreaii, Comjptes Rendus, 1858, p. 554, 



