1906.] 



Chloroform in the Blood of Animals. 



421 



certain proteids of the serum (Formanek) * or the hemolytic effect described 

 by Harleyf in 1865 with 5 per cent, of chloroform in blood, we have never 

 observed in any of our experiments, since both the anaesthetic and lethal 

 doses lie far below the quantity required to produce those effects. 



Grehant originally recognised that a combustible gas, which he believed 

 was carbon monoxide, could be extracted from blood, and, in 1898, Desgrez 

 and ISTiclouxJ stated that normal blood contains 1 c.c. per cent, of total gases 

 other than the normal, which they considered was carbon monoxide. During 

 anaesthesia extending over five hours, the amount of this gas was found 

 to be 2*5 c.c. per 1000 grammes of blood. Their recognition of this gas 

 depends on the fact that carbon monoxide oxidised by anhydrous iodic acid 

 at 150° C. yields carbon dioxide and free iodine. The latter is recovered, 

 dissolved in chloroform and the tint of the solution estimated against a 

 standard scale. Three experiments are described and from these it is 

 concluded that chloroform is actually decomposed within the organism. "We 

 have obtained no evidence that any gas of this nature appears during 

 chloroform narcosis, and since at least 80 per cent, of unchanged chloroform 

 can be extracted from shed blood, it appears improbable that the remaining 

 amount of chloroform in 1000 grammes of blood could yield anything like the 

 quantity of 2'5 c.c. of carbonic oxide gas. They further state that in intense 

 chloroform narcosis the proportion of carbonic oxide may even reach 6 '9 c.c. 

 per litre of blood. 



If the contention of Desgrez and Mcloux is correct that as much as 

 6 "9 c.c. of carbon monoxide may appear in 1000 grammes of blood during 

 intense chloroform narcosis, about 1/25 of the total haemoglobin would 

 be saturated with this gas. The following experiment was made to 

 determine whether any of the haemoglobin is in the state of CO- 

 hasmoglobin : — 



Cat, Weight 3 kilogrammes. 

 Ether anaesthesia commenced. 



4 c.c. of blood withdrawn from carotid artery and defibrinated. 

 Chloroform inhalation commenced, the vapour being given by air 



drawn over liquid chloroform in a Woulff s bottle. 

 Anaesthesia with chloroform finished, inhalation pushed until 

 respiration ceased. Blood to the amount of 75 c.c. was with- 

 drawn and defibrinated. This was intensely dark. 



* Formanek, ' Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chemie,' vol. 29, p. 416, 1900. 

 t 'Phys. Soc. London Proe.,' 1865. 

 t ' Compte3 Eendus,' p. 274, 1898. 



2.30 P.M. 

 3 - „ 

 3.6 „ 



4.20 „ 



