THE BILE. 101 



Tiedemann and Gmelin, after tying theJbiliary duct, which proved 

 on dissection to have continued impervious *, found the thoracic 

 duct still containing an abundance of matter, yellowish, indeed, 

 from the jaundice, but coagulating, and its coagulum becoming 

 red, precisely like chyle ; the small intestines had the soft flakes 

 usually considered chyle, but thought mucus by them, and both 

 large and small intestines contained nearly all the principles, ex- 

 cept those of the bile, seen in sound animals; but the contents 

 of the large intestines were exceedingly offensive. In the less 

 satisfactory experiments of MM. Leuret and Lassaigne, the tho- 

 racic duct was still full of chyle. 



Although the bile is seen, by experimenting upon the contents 

 of the duodenum, to cause a precipitation (Tiedemann and Gme- 

 lin deny it, but Dr. Prout has almost constantly seen it), the chyle 



In the year 1817, Dr. James Blundell tied the choledochus several times 

 in the dog and rabbit, and has ever since mentioned the results in his physiologi- 

 cal lectures. Generally the animal died of peritoneal inflammation, the bile 

 forcing its way into the cavity among the viscera, when the ligature had produced 

 ulceration ; but when the animal did not die, the jaundice disappeared after a 

 time, and the animal was nourished as before : the bile had found some outlet. 

 On opening the animals, about a fortnight after the experiment, he discovered 

 that fibrin had been effused round the tied portion of the duct, so as to 

 re-establish the canal, and the ligatures had disappeared. Dr. Blundell's 

 well-known accuracy renders all confirmation unnecessary, but I may mention, 

 that Mr. Brodie and others have since made the same experiment with the same 

 results. 



Dr. Blundell has on record the cases of two infants, four or five months old 

 in whom the hepatic ducts terminated blindly ; so that no bile entered the intes- 

 tines, and the stools were white, like spermaceti, and the skin jaundiced. But 

 the infants grew rapidly, and throve tolerably notwithstanding. He therefore 

 saw that nourishment could be accomplished without the mixture of bile and 

 chyme. Of these cases, one was examined by Mr. Luke, of the London Hos- 

 pital, the other by Mr. Gaunt, of Falcon Square. 



Dr. Blundell has for many years been in the habit of displaying the precipitating 

 agency of the bile upon the chyme, by varying the mode of admixture : 1. By 

 working chyme and bile together, when the white chyle appears in the mass, like 

 veins in marble : 2. By enclosing chyme in black silk, and wetting a part of the 

 external surface of this printer's ball, as it may be called, with bile ; when, on 

 rendering it tense, the liquid portion of the chyme oozes through the texture, and 

 renders it generally blacker, but whitens it conspicuously in those spots where it 

 meets with bile : 3. By filtering the chyme repeatedly, and then dipping into 

 the thin strained fluid a rod with a drop of bile at its extremity, white chyle 

 appears at the point of contact. 



He found the same results in the curious hybrid experiment, of employing 

 the bile of a dog, and the chyme of a rabbit. 



