NATURE AND ANALYSIS OF THE POISONS. 133 
In one instance a dog, struck by eight snakes, died in 
eighteen minutes, and exhibited uncoagulable blood. I am 
aware of no other case of loss of uncoagulable blood so rapid. 
It was rendered thus by the number of localities from which 
the ferment attacked the system. 
On the other hand, the frog, a small animal, receives the 
same dose of venom as would have entered the tissues of a 
larger animal ; yet it resists the poison most remarkably, by 
virtue of its powers as a cold-blooded creature, existing at the 
temperature of the atmosphere itself. 
The cause of death in chronic or secondary poisoning, may, 
with propriety, be referred to the incipient putrefactive 
changes which affect the blood, as well as the continued 
influence of the agencies which first act to depress the heart’s 
action, and destroy nerve function. 
Summing up what we have learned of the acute forms of 
poisoning, we may feel justified, according ‘to Dr. Mitchell, 
in concluding :* 
Ist. That the heart becomes enfeebled shortly after the 
bite. This is due to direct influence of the venom on this organ, 
and not to the precedent loss of the respiratory function. Not- 
withstanding the diminution of the cardial power, the heart 
is usually in motion, after the lungs cease to act, and its tissues 
remain for a time locally irritable. The paralysis of the heart 
is, therefore, not so complete as it is under the influence of 
Upas or Corroval poison. 
2d. That in warm-blooded animals artificial respiration 
lengthens the life of the heart, but does not sustain it so long 
as where the animal has died by Woordira or decapitation. 
3d. That in frogs the heart-acts continue after respiration 
has ceased, and sometimes survive until the sensory nerves 
* Crotalus Horridus, &c., by Dr. Neidhard. New York, 1868. Radde. 
