46 POISONOUS PROPERTIES OF SULPHITE OF LEAD. 
Dr. Crisp for permission to inspect a calcified rams testicle in 
his possession, concludes in the following terms : — 
“ The existence of two specimens of calcified ram’s testicle, 
and of drawings representing the incipient degeneration in both 
testicles of a goat, renders it not improbable that the disease is 
of more frequent occurrence in those animals than has hitherto 
been suspected. The characteristic feature of these morbid pro- 
ductions is, that the healthy tissue of the organs appears to have 
become impregnated with saline matters; for, while calcification 
of morbid deposits is not unfrequent, such degeneration of 
healthy tissues is comparatively rare. Collating Dr. Carswell’s 
statement, * that in the testicle which he figured, and in which 
the process of calcification was most advanced, the vas deferens 
and its branches appeared to have preserved their original size;’ 
and Dr. Crisp’s statement, that, in the specimen in his pos- 
session, ‘ the epidydimis and spermatic cord were healthy,’ we 
infer that the calcific degeneration commenced in the testicles, 
and independently of any change in their afferent or efferent 
vessels. And again, comparing Dr. Carswell’s first figure with 
the second, and this with the specimens in the possession of 
Mr. Folliott and Dr. Crisp, it seems warrantable to conclude, 
that, in the testicles, the tubes were the first to become impreg- 
nated with saline matters.” 
POISONOUS PROPERTIES OF SULPHITE OF LEAD. 
Mr. Greaves communicated the result of some experiments 
he had made by administering sulphite of lead to dogs. At a 
previous Meeting of the Society, Mr. Redwood had shewn 
that sulphite of lead is readily decomposed, and the lead 
rendered soluble, when exposed to the action of hydrochloric 
acid and other agents, which it would be likely to encounter in 
passing through the intestinal canal ; from which it was inferred 
that this salt of lead, the presence of which had been proved in 
sugar made by Dr. Scoffern’s process, could not, as represented, 
be perfectly innocuous. It still remained, however, to obtain 
direct evidence of the action of sulphite of lead on the animal 
system, and this was the object of Mr. Greaves’s experiments. 
EXPERIMENT No. 1 . — Effect of Internal Administration of 
Sulphite of Lead . — To a young healthy dog was administered 
daily twenty grains of carefully prepared sulphite of lead in 
animal food, commencing on Tuesday, October 23d. No appa- 
