70 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 1684, 



bottom of the stomach. Others by the relicts of the meat grown sour. So 

 many different opinions I shall neither pretend to reconcile nor decide on ; and 

 shall therefore only lay down the phaenomena afforded by an artificial digester, 

 and from them draw inferences as probable conjectures. But shall in the first 

 place premise a description of this digesting liquor, and see how far it may 

 probably parallel the natural ferment in the stomach. It is prepared from spirit 

 of sulphur, spirit of hartshorn, the chyle of a dog, and the saliva. The taste 

 of it is like meat vomited out of a full stomach, something sour, but will not 

 ferment with an alkali. 



It is pellucid and without any smell : the salt that it shoots into is cubical.* 

 Into a dram of this liquor I put a piece of veal, about the size of a nut, and 

 set it on a digesting furnace. In two hours time there came from the meat a 

 liquor having the colour and taste of chyle, and the meat afterwards was lighter, 

 dry, and insipid. It afforded the same phgenomena also in beef, mutton, or 

 any other meat. And though it has been affirmed by some, that the same 

 thing may be done by acid liquors only, yet in all the trials I have made upon 

 them, I have not observed the like phaenomena. Now since by the help of 

 this menstruum, there came from the meats a liquor having the colour and 

 taste of chyle, and since the taste of this menstruum is not distinguishable 

 from the taste which is perceivable in meats vomited out of a full stomach ; it 

 may be conjectured, that by some such menstruum the meat is digested in the 

 stomach.-|- I would not however be thought to affirm, that by a liquid men- 

 struum alone the meats are digested, but that there are likewise required these 

 further requisites, in some, or in most creatures, l. That the stomach receive 

 a gentle heat from the liver. 1. That it have a natural situation. 3. That it 

 be assisted by the omentum. This may be inferred from those creatures which, 

 having no caul, help concoction by doubling their hinder legs, and resting their 

 bellies upon them, as hares and conies. 4. That the stomach have a tunica 

 villosa : by which it is enabled to divide the meat into parcels, which must 

 facilitate the operation of the natural ferment ; as we see all menstruums 

 sooner dissolve metals when these are filed into parcels, than when they 

 continue in the lump ; and without a tunica villosa, the tunica carnosa would 

 be apt to be too much distended by our meat and drink, which would necessarily 

 weaken the tonical motion of the stomach. 5. It is necessary that there be 



* The saliva yields on analysis various phosphates, besides common salt (muriate of soda). The 

 " cubical crystals" abovementioned, would consist of tlie last mentioned salt. 



t The opinion of the food being digested in tlie stomach by the solvent action of a peculiar fluid 

 or menstruum (the gastric juice), has been confirmed by the experiments and observations of suc- 

 ceeding physiologists. 



