PHYSIOLOGICAL ACTION OF VENOM OF BLACK SNAKE. 159 
Rieder! has, on the other hand suggested, and Bruce* has 
_ adduced evidence to show, that these cells are not destroyed but 
only temporarily withdrawn from the circulation, and are to be 
found crowding the tissues of the liver, lungs, and medulla of 
bone. A similar temporary disappearance has also been found 
to follow the intravenous injection of a variety of other bodies 
among which may be mentioned nucleo-albumens,’ nuclein,* tuber- 
culin,® bacterial proteins,® and carmine in suspension.? With all 
these bodies the leucocytopenic phase is soon followed by one in 
which the number of leucocytes is increased. 
The cause of this disappearance of leucocytes after intravenous 
injections of venom, I am inclined for the following reasons to 
attribute to their collection in the tissues, and not to their rapid 
destruction :-— : 
(1) Solutions of venom one thousand times as strong as any they 
could possibly come in contact with in the blood-stream, under 
the conditions of the experiment, exert no disintegrating effect 
upon them in vitro. 
(2) It is almost inconceivable that the rapidity of their dis- 
Sppearance and reappearance can be explained, if one supposes 
them to be destroyed. In one of my experiments, a sample of blood 
taken immediately after the venom injection was so devoid of 
white cells, that it was necessary to search through many hundred 
‘Squares of the haemocytoineter in order to find one ; whereas a 
oe mmple of blood taken fifteen minutes after from the same 
Animal contained nearly as large a number as was found previous 
‘to the injection, 
(3) Sections of the organs especially the liver and lungs appear 
to contain an excessive number of leucocytes. (I have not made 
“@ny accurate quantitative observations. ) 
7: Beitriige z. Kenntniss d. Leucocytose, Leipzig, 1892. 
th verte Soe. Lond., iv., 1894. 
urton & Brodie—Journ. of Physiol., 1894. 
5 Tehisto wski, M. f. Chem., Vienna, 1891, Vol. x11., p. 221. 
4 witsch, Berlin Klin. Woch., 1891, p. 838. 
chner. 7 Werigo, Ann. l’Inst’ Pasteur, 1892. 
