318 Supposed Agency of Oahanism in transferring Colors, ^c. 



has always appeared to me as highly probable that there was some 

 shorter way for fluids to reach the bladder, than by the round about 

 road of the circulation. 



Coffee, spirits of turpentine, balsam copaiva, madder, and various 

 other substances, are detected, by their smell or color, in the urine, 

 sometimes, within a few minutes after they are swallowed. Can 

 they appear so soon in the urine, by their passage through the long 

 channel of the circulation ? The same substances often appear in 

 the perspiration and other secretions — may they not reach their des- 

 tination, in these cases also, by electrical percolation ? may not sud- 

 den salivation be explained on the same principle ? 



A difference of opinion has prevailed among chemists, as to the 

 mode by which nitrogen and oxygen unite to form the air. Some 

 maintain that they unite chemically, while most others regard their 

 union as only mechanical. As there are objections to both these 

 theories, as well as to all others, may not their union also take place 

 on the principle of electrical percolation ?* 



From analogies and reasoning on the subject, I am induced to be- 

 heve, that the skin of our system performs the office of our lungs, 

 by-decomposing the surrounding atmosphere. The oxygen, being a 

 negative body, must be attracted by the human body, which must al- 

 ways be in a positive state. It is known that bodies which have the 

 smallest attraction for oxygen, readily disengage it, from its weak 

 union with nitrogen. Why may not the human frame have this ef- 

 fect, as well as metal, or any other more positive substance than ni- 

 trogen ? If this be true, it accounts for the continuation of life in 

 pulmonary patients, who sometimes, before death, suffer an entire 

 loss of one lung and a partial decay of the other. In such an in- 

 stance, may not oxygen be supplied to the blood, through the me- 

 dium of the skin ? I am, moreover, led to believe, that the skin 

 also decomposes water, when applied to it for any length of time. 

 In this case, the skin takes up the oxygen, while the hydrogen is set 

 at liberty, being a positive body and therefore repelled by the body 

 which is positive. I think I have smelt impure hydrogen, exhaling 

 from my body after being made thoroughly wet in a shower. 



I merely throw out these suggestions as hints, intending when I get 

 leisure and a fair opportunity to improve upon them by experiments. 



See Mr. Dalton's theory, explained in Turner's Cliemistry, art. Atmospheric Air. 



