200 Miss Tehb, Note on the Liver Ferment. [April 30, 



and this whether the blood was previously washed out of the liver 

 or not. Several experiments were performed, of which the following 

 is an example : 10 grammes of dried liver, free from blood and 

 sugar, was allowed to act on a solution of glycogen for 22 hours at 

 25° C. The sugar produced was removed by dialysis, and on 

 adding phenyl hydrazin to a portion of the dialysate, typical 

 crystals of phenyl glucosazone were formed. The reducing power 

 of another portion was estimated, and after boiling the solution 

 with 2°/o hydrochloric acid for 30 minutes, the reducing power was 

 found to have increased but slightly — in the ratio 65 to 68 — which 

 change is probably due to the presence of dextrin, with or without 

 maltose. 



Extracts were made by soaking the dried tissue in 57o sodium 

 sulphate, the sugar initially present being subsequently removed 

 by dialysis, and these were found to be active in the same way. 



Also an extract was made from fresh liver, and this was found 

 to produce dextrose from starch, but no experiment was made with 

 glycogen. In most of the experiments digestion was allowed to 

 go on at 37° C. for about 20 hours, though sometimes for not 

 more than 4 hours ; and the resulting sugar was in some cases 

 removed by extraction with alcohol instead of by dialysis. 



Digestion was always carried on in neutral or faintly alkaline 

 media, and antiseptics, usually chloroform, were used throughout. 



In all cases, whether an extract or the dried tissue itself was 

 used, the product of the action on starch or glycogen always gave 

 crystals of phenyl glucosazone with phenyl hydrazin, and the 

 reducing power increased only slightly on boiling with acid ; hence 

 the conclusion is drawn that one pi-oduct of the action is dextrose ; 

 and, as far as they have gone, the experiments with fresh liver have 

 yielded the same result. 



April 30, 1894. 



Prof. T. McK. Hughes, President, in the Chair. 



D. B. Mair, B.A., Fellow of Christ's College, R. H. D. Mayall, 

 B.A., Sidney Sussex College, and H. C. Pocklington, B.A., St John's 

 College, were elected Fellows of the Society. 



The following Communications were made to the Society : 



(1) The modifications of FresneVs optical laws, that would 

 apply to circumstances of magnetic as well as electric aeolotropy. 

 By Mr J. Larmor. 



