302 



THE DUCTLESS GLANDS 



that a week after the operation fibrillary twitchings of the 

 muscles were noted, and that these ceased on voluntary move- 

 ment. The animal then became " cretinoid." There was a 

 " myxcedematous " condition of the subcutaneous tissues. 

 The tremors were relieved by keeping the animal warm. 

 According to Horsley, there were swellings of the skin of the 

 face and abdomen, due to the infiltration of the tissues by 

 mucin. The salivary glands became enormously hypertro- 

 phied and the parotid gland produced large quantities of 

 mucin. 



We are not concerned in this place with the nervous symp- 

 toms described by Horsley, but it may be observed in passing 

 that so far as I am aware no subsequent observer has been 

 able to obtain these " myxoedematous " symptoms in monkeys 

 or in other animals. Horsley gives no detailed protocols of 

 his experiments. 



Removal of the thyroid from different animals was carried 

 out by a number of observers during several succeeding years. 

 The majority of these confirmed the general views of Schiff as 

 to the effects of total extirpation of the thyroid. It must be 

 remembered that at this period the possibility of a separate 

 functional importance of the parathyroids was not suspected, 

 so that while in dogs, cats and monkeys thyroids and parathy- 

 roids were always removed together, in the herbivora the two 

 external parathyroids were left behind in what was called 

 " total thyroidectomy." For, although the external para- 

 thyroids were discovered by Sandstrom in 1880 and by Baber 

 in 1882, it was not until Gley rediscovered them and demon- 

 strated their functional importance in rabbits that experi- 

 menters gave them due consideration. This was in 1891. 



Following Horsley's work came a series of papers by numer- 

 ous authors. These all supported the view of Schiff as to the 

 effects of total extirpations of the thyroid. But some were 

 inclined to deny the supreme importance of the thyroid in the 

 animal economy and attributed the untoward symptoms 

 recorded by other workers to injury to nerves, reflex action, 

 and similar causes. Munk's observations are specially inter- 

 esting in view of the results obtained by some more recent 

 observers (vide infra). He came to the conclusion that the 

 chronic disturbance of nutrition in thyroidless animals is 

 nothing more than " gefangenschaftkachexia " which may 



