376 BLADDER, NORMAL ANATOMY. 



mon salt and taurfn, which are to be separated, is thrown down in green flocks by muriatic 



and the latter purified a second by crystalli- acid : nitric acid cautiously dropped into a 



sation. Taurin, when purified, is in prismatic solution of this colour ing matter gives it various 



crystals, neither acid nor alkaline, not altered shades of green, blue, and red. 



by exposure to air, inodorous, of a peculiar BlBLloORAPHy ._ BioncW , Historia hepatica, 2 



taste : soluble in about fifteen parts of cold wa- voh 4to> Genev< 172 5. Roederer, Experimenta circa 



ter, and nearly insoluble in absolute alcohol : bills nat. 4to. Argent. 1767. Cadet, Exper. sur 



it is fusible, and not decomposed by nitric acid. la bile des homines et des animaux : Mem. de 



In concluding this subject, we must again 1'Acad. de Paris, 1767. Bordenave, Analyse de 



express our conviction that many of the sup- bile, ibid ; ( Savans . etrangew, t. vii.) Madurg 



f ., Experiments upon the human bile, ovo. JLond. 



posed proximate components of bile are pro- 1? / 2 GMwi f Neue versuche zu ein wahren 



ducts of the various operations and re-agents to physiologic derGalle, 8vo. Bamb. 1782. Ploucquet, 



which it has been submitted, and that the ana- Exper. circa vim bills chyliferam, 4to. Tubing. 



lysis of Berzelius, which is the simplest, is 1792. Thenard, Deux mem. sur la bile : Mem. 



probably the most correct : from the uncertain d'Arcueil, t i Sounders A treatise on the .true- 



. J f i ture, &c. of the liver, Ovo. Lond. 179J. John, 



operation of various precipitants upon bile, and Chemische Tabrjlen: Tableaux chimiques, 4to. 



from the facility with which the results vary, p ar i s> i816. Chevreul, Note sur la presence de 



apparently in consequence of very trifling causes, cholesterine dans la bile de rhomme : Journ. de 



there seems to be a peculiar tendency in its Chim. Med. t. i. and Ann. de Chimie, No. xcv. 



component parts to undergo hitherto unex- Bracconnot, Rech. sur la .bile : Aan.de Phys. et 



Jfl .. de Chimie, Oct. 1829. Orfila, Elem. de chirme, 



plained modifications. 2 vol> gvo> Bergeliug , Traite de chimie : Hawaii, 



BILIARY CALCULI, or gall-stones. .These Nouv . sys teme de chimie organique, 8vo. Paris, 



concretions have been especially examined by 1833 j Anglice a Henderson, 8vo. Lond. 1834. 



Gren, Thenard, Fourcroy, and as to the fatty ( W. T. Brande.) 

 matter which they contain, by Chevreul.* 



Human gall - stones are, for the most BLADDER, (in anatomy.) (Gr. KV em;. 



part, composed of a crystalline aggregate of a Lat. vesica, vesicula. Fr. vessie, vesicule. Germ, 



species of adipocere, or as it has been termed Blase. Ital. vescica). This term is employed 



by Chevreul, cholesterine, (from ^oX*j, bile, and to denote a membranous sac, more or less 



<TTEgo$, solid,) with more or less colouring complicated in its structure, with one or more 



matter, mu co-albumen, and inspissated bile; orifices, and destined as a reservoir for parti- 



they are accordingly of various colours and cular fluids. We have, for instance, in most 



textures, but generally brittle and friable, animals provided with a liver, a gall-bladder 



Those which are chiefly cholesterine, or as it or reservoir for the bile ; in fishes we have a 



should more properly be termed cholestearine, swimming-bladder, vesica natatoria ; and in 



are white and crystalline, and lighter than the females of several insects, mollusca and 



water; the others are more tough, coloured, crustaceans, a bladder, recently described by 



and dense; their specific gravities, therefore, Auclouin, Milne Edwards, Des Hayes, and 



vary from 0.803 to 1.06. Their chemical ex- others, the function of which is to receive, 



amination may be conducted as follows : they during copulation, the prolific fluid from the 



may be powdered, and digested in water to male, and which has, therefore, been called 



separate the inspissated bile : then boiled in vesicule copulatrice. In fine, in a great num- 



alcohol, and the solution filtered whilst hot; ber of the animals provided with a urinary ap- 



as it cools it deposits the cholesterine, and paratus we have a urinary bladder, vesica 



often retains common fat and its acids in solu- urinaria. For a particular description of the 



tion. The portion which resists the action of first three varieties of bladder we refer to the 



alcohol may be digested in a weak solution of articles LIVER, PISCES, and INSECTA; that 



caustic potash, which takes up colouring matter of the urinary bladder forms the subject of the 



and muco-albumen : the solution, supersatura- succeeding article. 



ted by acetic acid, deposits these, and the co- (R. B. Todd.) 

 louring matter may afterwards be removed by 



alcohol. Any common albumen may be de- BLADDER OF URINE (normal anato- 



tected by ferrocyanate of potash added to the my). (Ktxrns ot/po^op^o?, vesica urinaria. 



acetic solution. Germ. Harnblase. Commonly known as the 



Cholesterine separates in white pearly scales Bladder.) The urinary, like the biliary appa- 

 from its hot alcoholic or etherial solution during ratus, consists of four principal organs, each 

 cooling; it fuses at about 280, and when accomplishing a different purpose, yet all con- 

 heated to about 400, it sublimes : in the open tributing to the same end, namely, the sepa- 

 air it burns like wax. Its ultimate components ration from the circulating medium of a consi- 

 are 85 carbon, 12 hydrogen, 3 oxygen. It is derable portion of aqueous and saline matter: 

 the most carbonaceous of all the varieties of fat. these are, first, the kidney or kidneys, which 



The gall-stones of the ox frequently consist are the principal, indeed the sole agents in 



chiefly of the yellow colouring matter of the this function; secondly, the ureters, the excre- 



bile, which is occasionally used by painters on tory ducts, whose office it is to convey the 



account of its brightness and durability : it is in- fluid secreted, drop by drop, as fast as it is 



soluble in water and alcohol, but readily solu- formed, which is by a slow and gradual pro- 



ble in weak solution of potash, from which it cess, to, thirdly, the urinary bladder, which 



serves merely as a temporary receptacle for it ; 



* Annales de Chimie, xcv. 5. and, fourthly, the icethm, or terminating ex- 



