158 ANALYTIC SECT. XIX, 
all his experiments undergone some dissolution, 
he conceived that this change had been effected 
by the solvent power of the gastric fluid. He 
made similar experiments on birds with gizzards, 
but in place of the pieces of flesh he substituted 
grain, which was also more or less dissolved in its 
passage through the intestinal canal. The solution 
of the grain, in the latter set of experiments, 
corresponding with the solution of the flesh in 
the first, confirmed him in the opinion that the 
gastric juice was the chief agent of decomposition 
in. both.. 
cecxcl. But if the gastric juice be so active 
a solvent in the stomach, it was reasonable to 
infer, that it would also dissolve the same sub- 
stances out of the body, when aided with heat; 
and to effect this kind of solution, Reaumeur 
made two attempts, but met with a complete 
failure in both instances. It was from his experi- 
ments that Haller concluded, that the gastric juice, 
even with the assistance of heat, does not digest 
out of the body. 
cccxcu. After the two memoirs of Reau- 
meur, came that of Mr. Hunter, in the Philo- 
sophical Transactions of London for 1772. In 
some instances of sudden death, he had found 
parts of the stomach in a half dissolved state, 
which he supposed to have been occasioned by the 
gastric juice operating on the stomach itself after 
