148 Detection of Bed and White \^jouSil\SSt.T&'} 
seem to be, yet fail to give the minute directions which would alone 
enable their readers to follow even at a distance in their footsteps. 
Being recently called upon to investigate this subject, as con- 
nected with a criminal trial in one of the Eastern States, I was led 
to some extended researches upon the dried blood corpuscle, develop- 
ing some of their characteristics which may prove useful to other 
microscopists engaged in similar studies, and contribute to extend 
the field of the instrument as an aid to medical jurisprudence. 
As intimated above, several of the standard authorities, among 
whom may be cited Taylor, of London, Briand, of Paris, and Wharton 
and Stills, of this city (Philadelphia?), in their respective works on 
' Medical Jurisprudence,' assert that, with proper care and practice, 
one can generally distinguish the characters of corpuscles in dried 
blood-stains ; as, for instance, the latter of these gentlemen informs 
us, on p. 678 of the edition of 1860, that — " When the tissue has 
been well soaked (in solution of sulphate of soda) the stains may be 
carefully detached with a scalpel and the liquid placed upon a 
glass slide, and immediately covered with another one. . . . 
A portion of the globules will be found free; while others will 
be attached to the fibres of the stufi*, but they will preserve their 
natural colour, volume, and more or less their shape also, to such 
an extent, however, as to be readily recognized." 
But, on the other hand, we find that many microscopists who 
have specially investigated the subject, entertain a difierent opinion 
as to the facility with which the problem can be solved ; thus, for 
example. Dr. Andrew Fleming concludes his able monograph upon 
blood - stains, republished from the columns of the ' American 
Journal of Medical Science ' for January, 1859, with the acknow- 
ledgment : — " From the experiments which I have made during a 
period of several years with blood belonging to different animals, 
when dried for a length of time and moistened again, I am forced 
to admit that great difficulty arises in attempting to fix its origin by 
the comparative size of the corpuscles ; and again, that the blood 
of ovipara, when kept for several weeks, does not present the pecu- 
liar elliptical corpuscles found in fresh blood in a form sufficiently 
perfect to justify me in declaring positively whence it proceeds." 
Dr. B. W. Eichardson, of London, in his work on the ' Coagu- 
lation of the Blood,' p. 459, observes : — " Much has been said and 
written about the differential diagnosis of the blood of man and of 
other mammalia. For my own part, I am free to say that if 
specimens of blood from man, from the ox, sheep, pig, guinea-pig, 
dog, cat, or rabbit were placed before me, I should be utterly unable 
to say with precision, from any examination which I could institute, 
chemical or microscopical, from which of these animals the specimens 
were derived." 
Professor J. Wyman, of Harvard College, one of our most skil- 
