1882.] On the Excretion of Nitrogen by the Skin. 357 



which I always found adhering to the skin, and having noted my 

 pulse, respiration, bodily weight, and temperature, I entered under 

 the canopy.* The coverings being carefully adjusted round my neck, 

 the gas furnace was lighted, the air-pump and hydrometer adjusted, 

 and the experiment continued for an hour, the time being carefully 

 noted. Before leaving the canopy the pulse respiration and bodily 

 temperature were again noted, also the mean temperature and point 

 of saturation of the atmosphere within the canopy. On leaving the 

 canopy I got into a bath containing twenty litres of Vartry water, 

 acidulated with half an ounce of dilute hydrochloric acid of known 

 strength. I took with me into the bath the linen sheet upon 

 which I had lain whilst under the canopy, and with it I gently 

 rubbed myself so as to remove any loose epithelial scales. On leaving 

 the bath I again weighed myself, and in twenty minutes after I again 

 noted my pulse, respiration, and bodily temperature. I caused the 

 linen and india-rubber sheets, as well as the towers containing the 

 dilute hydrochloric acid, to be washed in the water of the bath, and 

 then brought a specimen of it to my laboratory for analysis. On two 

 occasions I analysed the contents of the towers separately and got 

 hardly a trace of ammonia with Nessler's test, proving, in these 

 instances, at least, that free ammonia was not given off by the skin. 

 The process of analysis of the water which I employed was briefly as 

 follows : — I carefully measured 100 cub. centims. and poured it into 

 a fractional distillation flask, which I altered to suit my purpose by 

 shortening and bending the side tube upwards towards the mouth. 

 I now took a porcelain dish, in which I placed a small quantity of 

 pure sand, carefully cleansed by hydrochloric acid and subsequent 

 washing with distilled water, and moistened it with a drop of 

 strong, ammonia-free, sulphuric acid. Having placed the dish upon a 

 water-bath, 1 inverted the flask into it, and, properly suspending it, 

 carefully evaporated the water as it gradually flowed into the dish. 

 When nearly dry I removed the sand from the dish and mixed it with 

 soda-lime, in a small combustion tube, and proceeded to estimate the 

 quantity of nitrogen contained in the residue in the manner referred 

 to in a former paper. f Hence I calculated the quantity contained in 

 the twenty litres, and from this I deducted my constant, thus ascer- 

 taining the total quantity of nitrogen excreted by the skin during the 

 experiment. I have described an experiment in detail, as all the 



* In my commtmication to the British Association, I gave the results of my ob- 

 servations on the effect of the hot air bath upon the rate of the pulse and respiration 

 and on bodily temperature. I have since seen papers by Dr. Fleming, op. cit., and 

 Dr. 0. Large ("Archiv Gen. de Med.," Tom. i, 1880, p. 150), on the physiology 

 of the Turkish bath, which go more fully into the immediate effects of artificially 

 increased temperature upon the human body than I did, and I find that their results 

 are confirmatory of my own. 



f " Dublin Journal of Medical Science," vol. lix, No. 38, p. 81. 



