142 DR. PHILIP ON DIGESTION. 



g'ive his opinion respecting their contents, without having been told which was 

 which. He at once pointed out the healthy stomach, the whole contents of 

 which had undergone the action of the gastric juice. After carefully examin- 

 ing, and with an instrument moving about the contents of the other stomachs, 

 he declared he could discover no difference in them. Both stomachs were 

 chiefly filled with undigested food, the animals not having lived long enough 

 after the operation for the expulsion of some imperfectly digested food that still 

 remained in both. 



The foregoing experiments convinced those who witnessed their results, that 

 the irritation caused by the attachment of the cut end of the nerves to the 

 muscles, had no effect whatever in promoting the digestion of the food. 



Were it possible, as in the case of the nerve of a muscle of voluntary motion, 

 to excite the eighth pair to perform its office after its communication with the 

 brain is wholly intercepted, it is surely impossible that this could go on for 

 many hours, which are necessary for the digestion of the food. A nerve of vo- 

 luntary motion, if kept in a state of excitement after its separation from the 

 brain or spinal marrow, loses its power in a very short time, at most a few 

 minutes. 



The result of the foregoing experiment may be known before the death 

 of the animals. It appears from what was said in other papers which I had 

 the honour to lay before the Society, and which were published in the Philo- 

 sophical Transactions, that the effect of the excision of part of the eighth pair 

 of nerves on the lungs, eis well as on the stomach, is obviated by galvanism, the 

 animals (the dog and rabbit were those on which the experiments were made) 

 breathing under its influence as freely as in health. It is clear, that if the 

 power of the nerve be restored, its restoration must be as evident in the func- 

 tion of the one organ as the other, these nerves being equally essential to both. 

 In the foregoing experiments both the animals were affected with extreme 

 dyspnoea, the mechanical irritation of the nerves having no more effect in 

 relieving this symptom, than in promoting the due action of the stomach. 





