TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 125 



■was evidently the purulent secretions of tlie inflamed leg, whicli, by getting mixed 

 with the spirit lotions, stained the clothes employed, the serum or liquor puris 

 having previously contained it in a colourless form. 



[This case will be found more fully reported in the ' Medical Times and Ga- 

 zette,' September 24th, 1865.] 



On the Phjsiological Effects of the Vacuum Apparatus. Bij Dr. T. Jttnod. 



The author exhibited his exhausting boot in an improved form, and read a brief 

 notice of the physiological effects produced by its application. He related an 

 extreme case, in which, the blood ha\ing been drawn into a lower limb by the 

 boot, partial insensibility of the upper limbs followed. 



On the Leyitll as an Article of Food, and its Use from the Earliest Historical 



Time. By C. Gr. Monteith. 



The author thinks the lentil, as an article of diet, deserving of more consideration 

 than it has of late received. 



On the Action of the Nervous Tissue concerned in Perception. By W. E. C. 

 NoTJRSE, F.R.C.S., Felloiu of the Royal Medical and Chirurr/ical Society, 

 and President of the Brighton and Sussex Natural History Society. 

 Some approach towards understanding the action of the nervous tissue, con- 

 cerned in perception, may be gained by enumerating and scrutinizing the struc- 

 tural and functional conditions essential to that action. The structural conditions 

 are shown in the well-known microscopical anatomy of the parts. Tlie nervous 

 tissue is liberally supplied with blood, especially its central and peripheral expan- 

 sions. This supply of blood is intimately connected with the exercise of the 

 nervous functions, even with those called mental, since they are heightened, by 

 increased circulation, enfeebled by diminished circulation, altered by changes in 

 the blood, and made to cease when circulation stops. Of the functional conditions 

 attending the action of the nervous tissue, the circulation of the blood is the most 

 important. The blood stands in relation with the nervous tissue, 1st, as to its 

 mechanical conditions, which are alterations in its entire quantity, changes in the 

 quantity circulating in each part, its mutable relations to the calibre of the blood- 

 vessels, and variations in the rate and force of circulation ; 2nd, as to its chemical 

 conditions, the addition to it of some vapour or drug, alcohol, opium, chloroform, 

 and the like, or difterences in the amoimt of its contained salts or water ; 3rd, as 

 to its chemico-vital conditions, more or less carbonization or oxygenation, more or 

 less fibrine, albumen, or blood-coi-puscles, more or less recent chyle, or changes 

 from malassimilation or from actual disease. Under each of these different states 

 the perceptive power is foimd to vary in strength, in acuteness, and in correctness, 

 and is often held in abeyance or stopped. It can nevertheless maintain its action 

 imder many unfavovu'able circumstances. TJiese considerations, though not 

 explaining in what the nervous action consists, bring us nearer to it, and show 

 that the function of perception is intimately connected with the healthy and active 

 blood-nutrition of the nervous tissue and with its waste and repair. 



On the Functions of the Cerebellum. By W. T. S. Pride attx. 



On the Inhalation of Oxygen Gas. By Dr. B. W. E,rcirARDSO]sr. 



The paper was supplementary- to one read at the Oxford meeting. The author 

 said his experiments on the inhalation of oxygen had led him to an almost precise 

 knowledge of the conditions under which oxygen would most freely combine with 

 blood. It had been stated, in nearly every modern work on physiology, that 

 oxygen inhaled in the pm-e form is a narcotic poison. These statements are based 

 on the researches of Mr. Broughton, in which the late Sir Benjamin Brodie took 

 part. The observations of Mr. Broughton, in so far as the recital of the pheno- 

 mena observed by him were concerned, were strictly coiTCct ; but the inferences 

 that had been drawn from them were nearly altogether incorrect, and were, at the 



