Action of certain Reagents upon Coloured Blood- Corpuscles. 117 



spherical and the nucleus to become more distinct and tinged 

 yellow. Then a sudden recoil or jerk is observed, the corpuscle 

 at the same time elongating and swelling up. 'No rupture of the 

 envelope was seen. The contents of the corpuscle appeared gradu- 

 ally to pass out, or to be dissolved out, and the field of the 

 microscope became covered with granular debris. The nucleus was 

 left of a bright yellow colour and quite smooth and homogeneous in 

 appearance. As all the haemoglobin is dissolved out of the corpuscle, 

 the deeply stained homogeneous nucleus is seen in the interior of the 

 globular corpuscle, which is surrounded by a highly refractive enve- 

 lope, in which one, two, three, or more slight thickenings, or highly 

 refractive elongated bodies, are to be seen. (PI. 1, fig. 2, b, c.) Whether 

 these bodies are at all comparable to the thickenings, or "maculae," 

 already described by Roberts, it would be difficult to say. Perhaps 

 they are merely the debris of the intracellular stroma. Slight remains 

 of this stroma may sometimes be seen in the perinuclear portion of 

 the corpuscle, as after a time it becomes slightly tinged yellow and 

 is stained by fuchsin or magenta. Within the nucleus one, two, or 

 more highly refractive dots are always to be seen. When single the 

 dot presents the appearance of a nucleolus, but it occupies very 

 variable positions and is larger than the nucleolus revealed by the 

 action of dilute alcohol, already described by Ranvier and one of us.* 

 These dots are perhaps the remains of the intranuclear plexus. 

 (Fig. 2.) 



Hydrochloric Acid. 



1 per cent. Solution. — One of us has already described the sudden 

 enlargement and as sudden collapse of the corpuscles, with a simul- 

 taneous discharge of the haemoglobin, which results from irrigation 

 with a 1 per cent, solution of this acid.f 



2 jper cent. Solution. — On irrigating a drop of blood with a 2 per 

 cent, solution of hydrochloric acid the nucleus began apparently to 

 shrink away from its surroundings, becoming at the same time tinged 

 of a yellow colour, and showing an intranuclear plexus of fibrils. In 

 some of the corpuscles the nucleus had taken up an excentric situa- 

 tion, being placed at one end of the corpuscle or nearer one end than 

 another, showing how plastic the perinuclear portion of the corpuscle 

 is. (Fig. 3, b.) Its long axis was sometimes found to lie across 

 that of the corpuscle. (Fig. 3, h.) 



In some corpuscles the apparent shrinking of the nucleus was not 

 observed and in some it was very slight. In a corpuscle seen on edge 

 this change in the nucleus is very striking (fig. 3, e, g), and is per- 

 haps due to the acid fluid passing by endosmosis through the body 



* W. Stirling," Journal of Anat. and Physiol.," yol. x, p. 778. 

 f VV. Stirling, '' Text-book of Practical Histology," 1882, p. 2. 



