168 GLANDS IN HEALTH AND DISEASE 



the field of experimental physiology, and both are 

 thinkers untrammelled by any standardized meth- 

 ods of thought. For every "no" of Stewart, Cannon 

 finds a "yes." To-day as little as ever before is 

 Cannon disposed to agree with his colleague that 

 the adrenal effects may be accounted for on the 

 basis of greater flow, or of altered distribution of 

 the blood. Cannon hits back with the same weap- 

 ons that Stewart employs: he does not question 

 the results but he does question the methods. "The 

 work of Stewart and Kogoff was admirably quanti- 

 tative in character, but it was done under experi- 

 mental conditions which could not afford informa- 

 tion regarding the normal secretion of the adrenal 

 glands or the natural conditions which affect that 

 secretion. This conclusion applies to all inferences 

 as to the nature of adrenal activity which they 

 have based upon the employment of the pocket 



method. 1 



t 



J The "pocket" refers to a pocket in the inferior vena cava. 

 The pocket was made by opening the abdominal cavity, clamping 

 the vena cava immediately above the iliacs, then clamping the 

 renal veins, emptying the cava segments by stripping it upwards, 

 and placing a clamp on the vessel above the entrance of the 

 lumbo-adrenal veins. Any small branches of the cava segment 

 were tied. The pocket thus formed was allowed to fill with 

 blood from the adrenal veins, and the blood was either allowed 

 to pass into the general circulation by removal of the clamp of 

 the inferior vena cava, or was withdrawn and tested outside the 

 body on preparations of rabbit uterus and intestine. 



Professor Cannon's comment is characteristic: "Either be- 

 cause the opening of the abdomen produces a secretion unsur- 

 passable by reflex stimulation, or because that operation abolishes 

 abdominal reflexes, the influence of sensory stimulation on the 



