24 CHEMICAL PHYSIOLOGY. 



and after solution of all tissue by which they are held 

 together in the parts of animals, arrive as fluid oils in 

 the intestine, they are acted upon by the pancreatic 

 juice and the bile. The former affects them in two 

 ways. A small portion it decomposes, so that glycerine 

 and fatty acid are formed, another portion it emulges, 

 or makes fit to become subdivided into the very minu- 

 test mechanical molecules, and in that state to pass 

 through the small pores of the cylindric cells which 

 cover the villi of the intestine. The fatty acids mostly 

 combine with soda and pass as soaps into the venous 

 blood, and with this to the liver ; while the emulged 

 neutral fats pass into the lymphducts, and by them into 

 the venous blood, without passing through the liver. 

 After incorporation with the blood the fat is burned up 

 in the system, particularly the muscles. 



emuff'of -^ u ^ ^ nere i g y e ^ a particular form in which fatty 

 pXitic nd acid is found in the body, namely, emulged in phos- 

 phate of sodium solution. When palmitic or stearic 

 acid is boiled with common sodium phosphate, it forms 

 a milky fluid ; the acid is so finely subdivided that the 

 microscope can distinguish only the very finest mole- 

 cules. When this process is applied to neutral fats, 

 , or to oleic acid, no effect is produced. The emulsion 

 is a very loose combination, inasmuch as ether extracts 

 the fatty acids. This particular form of fatty acid 

 emulsion occurs in lipohsemia, or fatty blood disease, 

 in chylous urine, and in several effusions into internal 

 cavities.* Its formation is a normal occurrence, the 

 phosphate of sodium of the food (bread) yielding the 



* Compare on this subject my researches published in the ' Lancet.' 



