744 SPECIAL PHYSIOLOGY. 



obvious ill consequences, and, it is said, in a few cases, even from the 

 human body. In certain animals, the spleen is multiple, minute de- 

 tached spleens, named splenculi, existing near the principal organ. 

 When the latter is removed, the splenculi become enlarged, and so 

 supply, physiologically, the place of the extirpated spleen. In other 

 cases, the lymphatic glands of the neck and axilla have become in- 

 creased in size ; and, on the whole, the result of such experiments 

 would seem to show, not the want of importance of the spleen, but 

 that its functions may be performed, as it were, vicariously, by other 

 organs of the body. The same may be true in cases in which the thy- 

 roid body is^ diseased. It is said, however, that in animals, after 

 the removal of the spleen, the quantity of iron in the blood is dimin- 

 ished, and that the appetite becomes voracious, and the temper fierce. 

 Removal of the suprarenal bodies is fatal ; according to some, directly, 

 owing to the retention of some poisonous substance in the blood ; ac- 

 cording to others, indirectly, as a consequence of the incidental injury 

 to the nerves and other neighboring parts. (Harley.) 



THE LIVER CONSIDERED AS A BLOOD GLAND. GLYCOGENIC 

 FUNCTION OF THE LIVER. 



The action of the ductless or nutritive glands, viz., that of extract- 

 ing material from the blood, elaborating it, and, instead of eliminating 

 it by ducts, returning it into the blood, by means of venous or lym- 

 phatic absorption, is, to a certain extent, imitated by the liver, the 

 largest secreting gland in the body. In the embryo, the liver is, in- 

 deed, a true blood gland, blood-corpuscles even being developed in its 

 capillary network. But probably then, and certainly after birth, the 

 hepatic nucleated cells, which secrete the bile, like the special paren- 

 chyma of the ductless glands, attract and assimilate material from the 

 blood, and form a peculiar substance, which is not discharged by the 

 bile-ducts, but enters the blood either through the veins or the lym- 

 phatics ; most probably, however, through the former. But this sub- 

 stance is not albuminoid, like the supposed products of the assimilative 

 action of the ductless glands ; it is amyloid, forming an animal starch, 

 closely resembling the amylaceous substances developed so abundantly 

 in the Vegetable Kingdom. By Claude Bernard, its discoverer, it 

 was named glyeogene, from its Jrielding sugar when mixed with fer- 

 ments ; it has also been called hepatine (Pavy), and zo-amyline (Rou- 

 get). It is obtained by bruising the substance of the liver in water, 

 boiling the fluid to coagulate the albumen, filtering through animal 

 charcoal, and then precipitating the substance sought for, by means of 

 pure acetic acid or alcohol. It is white, tasteless, flocculent, and 

 readily soluble in pure water ; with iodine, it forms a reddish violet 

 compound, the color of which disappears at a temperature of 176, 

 but returns on cooling. It does not reduce the salts of copper. Min- 

 ute granules, apparently covered with an albuminous fibrin, are found 

 in the hepatic cells ; these are not fatty, being insoluble in ether, but 

 they behave with reagents in such a manner as probably to be parti- 

 cles of this substance. Its atomic composition is identical with that 



