Dept.] 
NATURAL SCIENCES OP PHILADELPHIA. 
3 
two kinds, neither of which are of albuminous nature. On plate 1, fig. 1, are 
drawn certain short abruptly acuminated crystals of a pyramidal form. These 
occur early, and are colorless, or nearly so. They strongly refract light, and are 
soluble in excess of ether, and in liq. potassae, and insoluble in water. They 
disappear from the decomposing blood within two or three days after their for- 
mation. They are probably of a fatty character. We also observe in the blood 
very beautiful groups of long, shining, colorless needles, and slender, double 
pyramids. See pi. 7, fig. 2. These also appear before the true albuminoid crys- 
tals are seen ; the addition of a little water readily dissolves them. They are 
undoubtedly of a saline character. 
The 3rd set of crystals in order of formation are the true albuminoid crystals. 
These magnificent microscopic objects present themselves in the sturgeon blood 
either as hexagonal columns, or as sections of these, constituting hexagonal 
tablets of the utmost beauty, pi. 2, 3, and 7. Granting these crystals to be of 
albuminoid character, as Lehmann, Franke, and others have clearly made out 
there are some additional points of sufficient interest to deserve remark. 
The mechanical behaviour of the crystals adds to the proofs of their animal 
character. Thus in place of being dissolved by certain re-agents, they become 
contracted and deformed, but lose no bulk. Again, if the cover glass be pressed 
down upon a large tetrahedron from the Guinea pig's blood, the crystal will 
sometimes break up, but occasionally one will yield to the pressure, and flatten 
out into a disc, resuming its angular form again when the pressure ceases. 
Here then are elastic crystals. 
The persistency with which these delicate albuminoid bodies retain their 
form when left in the putrefying blood is very remarkable. Thus, on the third 
of July I placed some sturgeon blood in a vial. It soon presented an abundance 
of crystals which remained in it quite perfect up to the April following, when I 
threw it away. During this period the blood was utterly putrid, and developed 
foul gases to such an extent as to drive the cork out repeatedly. 
This fact is the more singular, because almost every chemical re-agent acts 
on these crystals destructively, and because I have failed to preserve them as 
microscope specimens after very numerous efforts. 
These columns and hexagons are, I believe, larger than any blood crystals 
hitherto studied. I have formed them of one-eighth to one-twelfth of an inch in 
length. 
One chemist, Lehmann, is of opinion that the red coloring matter of the blood, 
which so adds to the beauty of these crystals, is an essential chemical constitu- 
ent. Against this view it may be urged : first, that the color varies even in 
crystals of equal thickness ; second, that I have often been able to bleach a 
crystal, or at least destroy or wash out its color with alcohol and water, with- 
out injury to its form. Third, that I have been able to re-dissolve the crystals 
in water and obtain them again by careful evaporation, devoid of color, but 
unchanged in crystalline type. My friend Prof. C. Johnston, of Baltimore, has 
obtained a like result with the blood crystals of the opossum. 
The blood crystals of the sturgeon I have found to be the same in form, from 
whatever part of the body obtained. In the spring of 1854, I opened a young 
sturgeon, whose spleen was very large, and absolutely stuffed with blood crys- 
tals, whose form was the same as that of the crystals obtained by artificial 
means. Very frequent examinations of the blood crystals of man have afforded 
me like results for him, and have shown how permanent is the type of crystal- 
line form in his case. The blood of the male, the female, the foetus and placenta ; 
and the blood of many diseases, as dysentery, measles, cholera, typhoid fever, 
yellow fever, pneumonia, etc., gave in every case the same form of blood crystal. 
Prof. Johnston, of Baltimore, informs me as a contrast to this statement, that 
the splenic vein blood of the opossum affords tetrahedral forms, whilst all the 
other blood of this animal yields rhombic crystals. 
The reactions afforded by the blood crystals of the sturgeon are difficult to 
follow, since many agents completely disintegrate or fibrillate them, without 
1858.] 
