INTERNAL PEOTECTIVE SECEETIONS 



39 



divergent, often indeed contradictory, results. Hypophysectomy, 

 initiated with little success by Horsley, Dastre, Gley, Marinesco, 

 was pursued with a better technique by some of the Italian 

 workers. 



Vassale and Sacchi (1892-94), in a considerable number of 

 experiments on cats and dogs, obtained the survival of a few 

 individuals, in which the hypophysis had been totally or partly 

 destroyed by cauterising with chromic acid, a method that is 

 certainly not free from objection. 



The first symptoms observed in these animals is that of great 

 depression and complete apathy, making them indifferent alike to 

 caresses or ill-treatment. 

 Motor disturbances, at 

 first slight and afterwards 

 more intense, set in. These 

 consist of fibrillary move- 

 ments, muscular contrac- 

 tions, rigidity of posterior 

 limbs, curvature of back, 

 unsteady gait,lastly clonic- 

 tonic spasms of varying 

 intensity, in the course of 

 which the animal suc- 

 cumbs without the slight- 

 est trace of infective or 

 other complications being 



I- j , Fio. 8. Section of pituitary body of horse. Stained with 



dlSCOVered at tne pOSt Weigert's method. (Lothringer.) The lighter, principal 

 IYlOrt"PlTl AVitb thpSP ce " s can be distinguished from the darker, chromaphile 



symptoms are associated 



anorexia, tachypnea, polyuria, growing density of highly alkaline 

 urine (without either albuminuria or glycosuria), hypothermia, 

 rapid and progressive emaciation, coma not infrequently preceding 

 death, which occurs in 2-11 days after the operation. 



Gatta (1896) and Kreidl and Biedl (1897) repeated these 

 experiments, and obtained results which agreed approximately 

 with those of Vassale and Sacchi. 



The syndrome obtained by Caselli (1900) in his many experi- 

 ments on hypophysectomy in both dogs and cats was somewhat 

 different : depression of mental powers, motor disturbances, 

 curvature of back, spastic gait without convulsions, progressive 

 cachexia, rapid loss of weight, coma, death. 



This syndrome has undeniable resemblances with that which 

 appears after excision of the thyro-parathyroid organs, justifying 

 the surmise of Eogowitsch (1888) that the pituitary and the 

 thyroid glands are homologous, and are therefore able to function 

 vicariously. In order to discover why rabbits always support 

 thyroidectomy without injury, he made a microscopic examination 



