214 VENOMS 



pancreatic juice. Herein is to be found the explanation of the fact 

 that the non-poisonous snakes, although destitute of organs of 

 inoculation, possess supralabial or parotid glands which produce 

 venomous saliva. 



Experiments have been made by Ch. Fere' to determine the 

 effect upon the development of the embryo of the introduction ot 

 venom into the albumen of the egg of the fowl. He found that 

 83 per cent, of the embryos, developed in eggs intoxicated with 

 0"05 milligramme of viper-venom and opened after being incubated 

 for seventy-two hours, exhibited various anomalies in development. 



E. — Action of Vaeious Diastases upon Venoms. 



Venoms are modified or destroyed by certain normal diastases 

 of the organism. It was shown long ago by Lacerda, Weir Mitchell, 

 Sir Joseph Fayrer, and Lauder Brunton, that it is possible to 

 introduce without danger into the stomachs of adult animals 

 amounts of venom many times greater than the lethal dose. I have 

 repeatedly verified this, but have nevertheless observed that young 

 mammals, while being suckled, readily absorb venom by their 

 alimentary canal, and succumb td the ingestion of doses scarcely 

 larger than those which kill when subcutaneously injected. Here 

 we have a very important fact, which once more proves how easily 

 the intestinal mucous membrane of young animals is permeated 

 by toxins. By my instructions Welirmann^ and Carrifere,^ in my 

 laboratory, have studied the modifications undergone by venoms 

 in the alimentary canal of rabbits. We have seen that these 

 animals can ingest without inconvenience doses of venom 600 times 

 greater than the lethal dose, and that, if we cause these ingestions 

 to be repeated several times, contrary to the assertion of Fraser* (of 



' Comptes rendus de la SocieU de Biologie, January 11, 1896. 

 ' Wehrmann, Annates de Vlnstitut Pasteur, 1897 and 1898. 

 ' Carrifere, " Sur le sort des toxines et des antitoxines dans le tube digestif," 

 ihid., 1898, p. 435. 



* British Medical Journal, 1895 and 1897. 



