320 THE DUCTLESS GLANDS 



tottering gait, loss of appetite, tachycardia, rapid emaciation, 

 and lowering of body temperature. One of the cats, operated 

 upon on January 5, 1896, was still alive in March of the same 

 year, but was much emaciated and in a state of chronic 

 cachexia. The nine dogs all died within eight days, mostly on 

 the third or fourth day after the operation. They were as a 

 rule in good health the day after the operation, but began to 

 show symptoms on the second or third day, and then rapidly 

 died, after manifesting a variety of morbid symptoms. These 

 were psychical depression, muscular tremors, paresis of the 

 muscles of mastication, trismus, rigidity of the hind-limbs, 

 uncertain gait, general muscular feebleness, and convulsions. 

 There were also anorexia and vomiting, palpitation and 

 dyspnoea. The urine was scanty and sometimes contained 

 traces of albumin. 



The symptoms after removal of the four parathyroids were, 

 as Vassale and Generali pointed out, analogous to those 

 observed after removal of thyroid and parathyroids, an 

 operation which had been so often unwittingly performed 

 since the time of Schiff. The Italian observers did not note 

 very marked convulsions ; these only occurred near the fatal 

 termination. The predominating features were, in fact, ex- 

 pressive of diminution of the excitability of the nerve centres ; 

 there was, in fact, a rapidly fatal paralysis. The autopsy 

 usually revealed nothing abnormal in the lung ; spleen and 

 kidneys were congested. The nervous system was normal with 

 the exception (in some cases) of a certain degree of anaemia. 



The authors were satisfied that the fatal issue was not due 

 to complications arising from the operation itself, or to lesions 

 of the thyroid or the surrounding nervous structures. In 

 most cases the wound was in process of healing by first inten- 

 tion ; in the cats there was very often complete cicatrization. 

 Vassale and Generali state that the thyroid suffered little or 

 not at all in the operation. In some cases the thyroid left 

 behind possessed no colloid in its lymphatic spaces. They 

 were surprised to find that death supervened in a shorter time 

 than after removal of both thyroids and parathyroids. 



In their second communication Vassale and Generali re- 

 corded a series of variations upon their original experiments. 

 Thus they extirpated the two parathyroids of one side, with 

 practically no effects. Removal of the four glands in two 



