422 WALLACE LARKIN CHANDLER 
deep sleep. This condition generally lasted until they died — the duration of the effects 
being from twenty-five minutes to twelve hours after the administration of the poison. 
When the action of the poison was slower there was often no visible effect for hours or 
days. At first there was always a little discomfort from the taste of the oil; but this soon 
subsided, and then the animals appeared to be in perfect health for a day or more; they would 
run about as lively as usual, and would eat their food heartily; but suddenly’ there would 
be a look of distress, and perhaps an attack of voraiting, and then a fit of epilepsy. When 
this had subsided the animals were weak, and sometimes they were paralyzed in the hind 
extremities. After two or three of such attacks, the loss of power extended to the fore limbs, 
and then they would lie upon the side in a perfectly helpless condition; after which the prog- 
ress of the case was much the same as that already described, except that it was considerably 
slower: consciousness, for example, would be retained for days after the paralysis had set in; 
and although the animals were quite unable to stand, they would take food and drink when 
they were put into the mouth; in fact the condition in which they lay was most distressing; 
the look was anxious and full of fear, the limbs were in constant motion, and every now and 
then there would be a violent struggle, as if the creature was in a fit, or was making fruitless 
efforts to rise. This would last for days, and then there would be either a gradual resto- 
ration of voluntary power, with complete recovery, or death from exhaustion. The time 
which elapsed from the administration of the poison to the coming on of the first serious 
symptom — the epileptic fit — varied from nineteen hours to seventy-two: in most cases it 
was about two days, and the time of death was from four to nine days. 
Letheby explains the long period of inaction as being due to the time 
required for the conversion of nitrobenzene into anilin. He does not 
explain the reason for the difference between the two types of effects. 
Guttmann (1866) thinks this is not the real explanation of the latent 
period, for if an animal were given only from thirty to sixty drops of intro- 
benzene there would not be enough in the body to form anilin since nitro- 
benzene is continuously excreted by the lungs. Guttmann states, further- 
more, that according to Bergmann two grams of anilin is not fatal to a 
small dog, and therefore from thirty to sixty drops of nitrobenzene could 
not be fatal if it were all converted into anilin. 
Guttmann carried out experiments on frogs, rabbits, pigeons, and chick- 
ens. He states that in frogs he obtained paralysis of all movements and 
the abolition of all reflexes. This result was obtained whether the drug 
was given by mouth, by injection under the skin, or by exposure of the 
frog to the vapor under a bell jar. He concludes that since the muscles 
reacted to stimuli, the action of the drug was central, in contrast with 
that of curare and coniin, which act on the peripheral nerve structures. 
His paralyzed frogs did not recover. Dresbach (Dresbach and Chandler, 
1917) obtained only depressant action on frogs, but in his experiments 
frogs that were paralyzed for from one and one-half to two hours recovered. 
Guttmann produced death in rabbits by placing in the mouth as little 
as 4 mil of the drug. The symptoms reported were unsteadiness, stagger- 
ing, loss of reflexes, wide pupils. Death resulted in each case in about 
