[ 3 7 6 ] 
leaving any coagulum behind : by this means they 
have an opportunity of mixing it with other fub- 
ftances for the ufes of the kitchen. 
Although the coagulable 'lymph fo readily be- 
comes folid when expofed to the air, yet whilft it 
circulates it is far from being folid : it has indeed 
been fuppofed to be fibrous, even whilft moving, 
in the blood-veflels, but erroneoufly. 
It is this coagulable lymph which forms the in- 
flammatory cruft, or buff as it is called. It likewife 
forms polypi of the heart, and fometimes Alls up the 
cavities of aneurifms, and plugs up the extremities 
of divided arteries. It is fuppofed, by its becoming 
folid in the body, to occafion obftrudtions and inflam- 
mations ; and even mortifications, from the expofition 
to cold, have been attributed to its coagulation. In a 
word, this lymph is fuppofed to have fo great a ftiarc 
in the caufe of feveral difeafes, that it would be de- 
finable to afcertain what brings on that coagulation, 
either in the body or out of it. 
The blood, when received into a bafon and buf- 
fered to reft in the common heat of the atmofphere, 
very foon jellies or coagulates ; the part which now 
becomes folid is the coagulable lymph, as has been 
fhewn above. The circumftances in which it now 
differs from what it was in the veins, are thefe: it 
is laid open to the air, to cold, and is at reft ; for 
whilft in the body, air is excluded, it is always of a 
confiderable warmth, and is always in motion. The 
queftion is, to which of thefe circumftances its coa- 
gulation whilft in the bafon is chiefly owing. This 
queftion, I believe, cannot well be anfwered from 
the experiments that have hitherto been made. It has 
indeed 
