OF THE SEROUS SPLANCHNIC MEMBRANES. 179 



certain glands supposed to be lodged in their tissue. Ruysch 

 has proved that these pretended glands do not exist. Hunter 

 thought that this secretion was produced by a true transuda- 

 tion, analogous to the cadaverous transudation through the 

 areolae, interstices or an organic porosities of the tissue of the 

 vessels. Although the true way and organic mode by which 

 the perspiratory and other secretions are performed, are not 

 well known, we may at least affirm that they differ from tran- 

 sudation, which takes place only in the dead body. The sero- 

 sity in the healthy state is so small in quantity, as to be 

 scarcely perceptible, and hardly capable of being collected. 

 Hewson collected, from animals suddenly killed, a small quan- 

 tity of the liquid that humects the serous membranes, and he 

 saw by exposing it to the air and leaving it at rest, that it 

 coagulated like the coagulable lymph of the blood. He was 

 not able to collect the serosity of the cellular tissue. Bostock 

 has found in the healthy serosity of the splanchnic cavities, 

 water, albumen in less proportion than in serum, incoagula- 

 ble matter and salts. Schwilgue found in it, albumen, an ex- 

 tractive matter, and a fatty matter. From the examination that 

 1 have made of the serosity of the splanchnic cavities, it seems 

 to me, that the incoagulable matter is gelatiniform mucus, 

 similar to that found in the coagulated albumen of the serum 

 of the blood. The coagulability of the healthy serosity, ob- 

 served before Hewson by Lower, Lancisi, and Kaau, has 

 been, on the contrary, denied by Sarcone,Cotunnio and Gero- 

 mini;* I believe this coagulability always exists in the healthy 

 state. 



233. Of all the serous membranes, those of which we now 

 speak, are those whose functions and morbid actions are the 

 most closely connected with the other organic phenomena, 

 presenting, however, some varieties; thus the membrane of 

 the testicle, and that of the abdomen, differ greatly in this 

 respect. 



234. The greater part of what has been said respecting 

 the morbid changes of the whole serous system, may be ap- 



* tfaggio sullagenesi, e cura ddl" idrope. Cremona, 1816. 



