518 Messrs. Buckmaster and Gardner. Supposed [Aug. 12. 



blood gases over iodine pentoxide at 150° C, and estimating the iodine 

 liberated by the method of Rabourdin. Beyond the fact that carbon 

 monoxide decomposes iodic anhydride under these conditions, whereas neither 

 hydrogen nor methane will do this, Desgrez and Nicloux bring forward no 

 evidence whatever that the liberation of iodine in their experiments is due 

 to carbon monoxide from the blood. 



They explain the production of carbon monoxide in chloroform anaesthesia, 

 in the light of observations of Desgrez,* that chloroform is decomposed by 

 a solution of potash 1 : 8 with production of carbon monoxide according to 

 one of the following equations : — 



CHC1 3 +2K0H = 2KC1+H 2 + HC1 + C0; 

 CHCI3 + KOH = KC1 + 2HC1 + CO. 

 But the blood is certainly not an alkaline fluid in the sense that even an 

 extremely dilute solution of potash is : the blood is both alkaline and acid 

 according to the indicator chosen. This reaction cannot therefore be 

 regarded as lending support to their conclusions. 



The statement that carbon monoxide is contained in blood was apparently 

 confirmed by Saint-Martin.f This observer worked with large quantities of 

 blood, 500 c.c. being taken for an experiment. The blood was mixed with 

 oxalate of potassium solution in the proportion of 1 gramme of the salt to 

 500 grammes of blood. The gases evacuated from this mixture at 45° C. 

 by the blood pump were rejected, and on the subsequent addition of 250 c.c. 

 of saturated tartaric acid solution a further liberation of 30 to 40 c.c. of gas 

 occurred. This proved to be a complex mixture of gases among which was 

 carbon monoxide, which he absorbed with ammoniacal cuprous chloride. 



In two papers, Lepine and BouludJ state that in 25 c.c. of dog's blood they 

 could find no carbon monoxide, though working with the apparatus devised 

 by Desgrez and Nicloux. In blood taken post mortem of severe cases of 

 anaemia, carbon monoxide is present, whereas in control cases which were 

 non-anaemic the presence of this gas could not be detected. After injections 

 of oxalate of calcium or tartaric acid into the circulation as much as - 4 c.c. 

 of carbon monoxide per 100 c.c. of blood was found. Practically no experi- 

 mental details however are given in their papers. 



Finding all these results difficult to understand, we incidentally, during the 

 course of some other experiments, made an examination of a sample of the 

 blood of a cat which had undergone a prolonged anaesthesia, both spectro- 

 scopically and by Haldane's method, without being able to detect the 



* 'Comptes Eendus,' November 15, 1897. 

 t ' Comptes Eendus,' February 14, 1898. 



% Lepine et Boulud, ' Comptes Eendus,' p. 56, 1905, and p. 302, 1906. 



