MAKUAL OF CATTLE-FEEDING. 63 



The bile is secreted in very considerable quantity, bnt 

 most of wbat is not used in digestion is taken up by tlie 

 blood-vessels and resorbents of tlie intestines. The color 

 of the solid excrements is due largely to portions of the 

 bile that escape resolution. 



The pancreatiG juice^ the secretion of the pancreas, or 

 sweetbread, is a clear, viscid, colorless liquid, having a 

 slightly salt taste and a distinctly alkaline reaction. 



It contains at least three distinct ferments, viz. : a dias- 

 ta&e^ capable of converting starch into sugar; tryj)si7hy 

 which acts on the albuminoids ; and a ferment w^hich sepa- 

 rates fats into glj cerine and fatty acids. 



By virtue of the first of these ferments, the starch of 

 the food which is not acted on in the stomach is rapidly 

 converted into sugar. 



The trypsin of the pancreatic juice acts powerfully upon 

 albuminoids in much the same way as the pepsin of the 

 gastric juice, but with the differences that trypsin acts in 

 alkaline or at most very weakly acid Golution, and that 

 the decomposition goes further. 



Under the action of pepsin the albuminoids yield chiefly 

 peptones, wdth small quantities of the well-known amides, 

 leucin and tyrosin, while trypsin, on the contrary, decom- 

 poses the peptones at first formed, and produces abundant 

 quantities of the amides just mentioned, at least in artifi- 

 cial digestion experiments. 



The action of the pancreatic juice upon the fats is a 

 two-fold one ; it rapidly converts them into an exceedingly 

 fine and permanent emulsion, and more slowly decom- 

 poses them into their constituents, glycerine and fatty 

 acids. 



It will thus be seen that the pancreatic juice is a most 

 important secretion, acting, as it does, upon all tlu*ee 



