178 REPORT— 1866. 



If inferior animals bo subjected to absolute etber, and the influence of the 

 vapour on their lungs, heart, and blood be carefully obscryed, we find that the 

 lungs undergo a slight congestion, that the heart is filled with blood on both its 

 sides, and the venous blood in its transit through the pulmonic circuit ceases 

 to become arterialized. At the same time there is no destruction of the parts 

 of the blood, and the process of coagulation is unaltered. T\Tien death is 

 induced by pure ether, the event occurs by arrest of respiratory power. It 

 occurs much in the same way as in death by drowning or by suffocation in 

 carbonic acid. It is a great point to state, and it is most strictly true, that 

 absolute ether has no directly poisonous action upon the heart. I have seen 

 good pulsation of both sides of the heart for forty-five minutes after what 

 may be considered the death of the animal. For this reason the action of 

 absolute ether contrasts most favourably with chloroform. Chloroform kiUs 

 by its paralyzing action iipon the heart : hence when chloroform becomes 

 deadly, it is inevitably deadly because it becomes impossible to remove it from 

 the parts on which it acts to destroy. Ether, on its side, when it begins to 

 cause embarrassment, is acting simply xipon the respiration; and it is only 

 necessary to cease to administer it to ensure recovery. 



On the whole, after a most careful comparison of the action of absolute 

 oxide of ethyl with the action of other volatile substances possessing 

 ansesthetic properties, I claim for it that it is the safest of all known anaes- 

 thetics, that any indifferent effects arising, in past times, from its employ- 

 ment were due to badness of the article, and that science, not less than regard 

 for human life, bids us, when a general ansesthetic is absolutely necessaiy, 

 go back to ether as the safest agent. 



In order to ascertam what would be the effect of actually impregnating 

 the whole body of an animal with absolute ether, I injected one ounce of it 

 into the aorta of an animal (a rabbit) already rendered insensible by the 

 vapour. The result was that the fluid injected began to boil rapidly in the 

 tissties with a free escape of ether-vapdm-, followed by a sudden, almost in- 

 stant stiffness affecting the muscles of the whole body. This effect was due 

 to the rapid extrication of heat from the tissues. It was a kind of general 

 freezing of the tissues. 



Acetate of Ethyl and Hydeoflttoeic Ethee. 



The acetate of ethyl and hydi-ofluoric ether are chiefly remarkable for 

 their powerful solvent action on all the tissues of animals. They, can neither 

 of them be safely administered by inhalation, but both of them may admit of 

 being largely and usefully employed for the destruction and removal of 

 morhid growths. Directed on the blood they break it up absolutely, destroying 

 alike the corpuscles, the fibrine, and the albumen. In short, hydrofluoric 

 ether may be looked on as a universal solvent of the animal tissues ; nothing 

 escapes its action except the gelatinous structiires, and these not altogether. 



iSTiTEiTE OF Ethyl. 



The nitrite, or more correctly the hyponitrite of ethyl, nitrous ether, is 

 made in a similar manner to nitrite of amyl, the difference being that the 

 nitrous fumes are passed through ordinary alcohol. The fluid when pure is 

 of a light amber-colour ; the specific gravity is U-OoO, and the boiling-point 

 G0° Fahr. The physiologist who would work with it, should mix it with 

 absolute ether in fixed proportions — say, of ten, twenty-five, or fifty per cent. 

 It is so volatUe that without this precaution it cannot be readily employed. 



The action of nitrite of ethyl, as Professor Wanklyn suggested last year, 



