120 
Proceedings of the Royal Society 
3. On the Effect of Temperature on the Compressibility of 
Water. By Professor Tait. 
4. Chemico-Physiological Investigations on the Cephalopod 
Liver, and its identity as a true Pancreas. By Dr 
A. B. Griffiths, Ph.D., E.C.S. (Lond. and Paris), Lecturer 
on Chemistry and Physics, Technical College, Man- 
chester, &c. Communicated by W. E. Hoyle, Esq., M.A. 
In a memoir published in the Chemiccd News, vol. xlviii. page 
37, and the Journal of the Chemical Society, 1884, page 94, I gave 
some account of a peculiar excretory product found in the Sepia's 
“ liver.” The product was found to be albumin in pseudo-crystalline 
aggregations when examined under the microscope. These bodies 
are not of a constant occurrence in this organ of the Sepia. Since 
the publication of the above paper, which is a year and a half ago, 
I have made a thorough examination of this organ in Sepia, which 
substaniate and extend the observations of Krukenberg,* Eredericq,f 
and Jousset de Bellesme.J 
After carefully dissecting it out of the cavity of the body of a 
fresh Sepia, I performed the following experiments: — 
1. A small portion of the organ was placed on starch paste. 
The starch granules disappeared, with the exception of their 
celluloid covering, and on treating with water and testing the 
solution with Pehling’s solution, sugar in the dextrose form was 
found. 
2. The organ gave an alkaline reaction to litmus paper. 
3. When a small portion of the organ was placed in a tube with 
a little oil and agitated, an emulsin was produced • — this emulsin 
had first an alkaline reaction, and after some time became acid, owing 
to the formation of butyric acid and other acids of the fatty series. 
4. The action of it on milk was to render the milk transparent in 
four hours’ time. 15 cubic centimetres of milk were rendered 
transparent by 6 milligrammes of the tissue of the organ. 
5. When a few drops of the secretion of this organ were examined 
* Untersuch. physiol. Inst. Heidelberg , Bd. i. p. 327, 1878. 
t Bull Acad. Sci. Belgique, t. lvi. p. 761, 1878 ; Rev. Internat. Sci., iii. p. 
263, 1879. 
+ Comptes Rendus, t. lxxxviii. pp. 304, 428, 1879. 
