140 REPORT— 1870. 



any thing else than a beautiful specimen of genuine organized fibrinous substance. 

 Hitherto we haA^e not been able to collect enough of the gas to subject it to analysis. 



These experiments, still being continued, appear to be fraught with incalculable 

 results as regards nutrition, growth, and reparation of tissue, &c. in the animal 

 economy, and the development of certain kinds of disease. Fibrin is of essential 

 Talue also in the arrest of haemorrhage and of the eruption of purulent matter 

 among the tissues of the body, and appears to be a chief and fundamental source 

 of all vital energy, strength, and function. 



In No. 2 we have, as previously known, an illustration of the influence of neutral 

 salines in the prevention of the formation of fibrin ; and in No. 3, the reason why 

 the London draymen and others, who so extensively indulge in alcoholic drinks, 

 notoriously possess so little stamina and feeble constitutional vigour. 



The ivater-dressing now so extensively employed in hospitals powerfully corro- 

 borates the results of exp. No. 1. We have often seen ulcers and sores of long 

 standing, although previously devoid of any tendency to cicatrization, when sub- 

 jected to the action of water in wet lint (covered by waterproof), in some twelve 

 to twenty-four hours they very frequently assume an opaque white and fibrinous 

 appearance, sometimes by a perfect bloom of the same covering the entire surface ; 

 or at other times by the formation of white edges, and little dots or islands of the 

 same appearing in various parts of the sore ; water thus effecting in the living 

 tissues and fluids the same process, and repeating the experiment before us in the 

 living organism itself. 



This experiment appears to unfold a new view of the functions of the lymphatic 

 and lacteal systems and absorbent veins. Excess of water cannot exist in the 

 sanguineous system ; but it is in the absorbents that not only is albuminous matter 

 collected, but also water is absorbed from the circulatory system, the tissues, the 

 atmosphere by the skin, and other parts of the system, for the great and essentially 

 important purpose, the transformation of albumen into Jihrin, by the admixture of 

 the former with that fluid in their parietes, and in the lymphatic and mesenteric 

 glands. 



Finally, the product herein formed cannot be albumen, which does not coagulate 

 at a temperature below 145° Fahrenheit, and this formation was produced in cold 

 water. Either, therefore, the product of these experiments must be accepted as 

 veritable fibrin, or some substance highly resembling the same, and not albumen ; 

 or the coagulation of albumen must henceforth be admitted to take place sponta- 

 neously in water perfectly cold. 



Hemarls on Variation of Colouring in Animals. By T. B. Gbieeson, M.D. 



Variation in colour depends on modifications of albinoism in wild animals, and 

 these modifications, hereditary, give rise to strange variations, which were illus- 

 trated bj' the exhibition of a number of specimens. A tendency was also mentioned 

 of certain species to become black, illustrated by a number of specimens. 



On the Antise^Hic Treatment of Contagia as Illustrative of the Germ Theory 

 of Disease, By William Hope, V, C. 



On the Comparison of the Shoulder-hones and Muscles with the Hip-bones and 

 Muscles. By Professor G. M. HuMrnar, M.D., F.Ii.B. 



Referring to the view of rotation of the fore and hind limbs in opposite direc- 

 tions, propounded in his ' Essay on the Limbs of Vertebrate Animals,' and now 

 admitted by most anatomists, he was of opinion that the extension of the same 

 principle to the shoulder and pelvic girdles, suggested by Prof. Flower in the last 

 Number of the ' Journal of Anatomy,' cannot be maintained. On the contrary, he 

 gave reasons for believing that the outer surface of the scapula, behind tlie spine, 

 together with the subscapularis and teres minor muscles, correspond with the outer 

 surface of the ilium together with the glutei muscles ; that the spine of the sea- 



