582 INVESTIGATIONS INTO THE FUNCTIONS OF 
afterwards goes on to say, that he has found the contagious 
character of the disease to be similar in the three provinces 
through which he has extended his inquiries. And when, he 
adds, we come to inquire further, in order to ascertain if there 
be any other known causes of the epizootic, we encounter nothing 
but doubt and uncertainty. 
The production of the disease has been attributed to insuf- 
ficiency in the supply of air for cattle to breathe in their habita- 
tions ; but I have observed the cow-houses of those who had 
them constructed capacious and airy, and those of others who 
have allowed no more to every head of cattle than a certain 
area of space, the fresh air being admitted through apertures 
and ventilators made in the walls, and yet there has been no 
difference in the mortality. Changes of temperature have like- 
wise been thought to be among the productive causes; but 
observation and aggregated facts do not confirm this notion. 
Up to the present time there is but one conclusion we can come 
to on this part of our subject, which is, that disease rages with 
much more intensity among cows in milk and among milk 
calves than among young beasts in their second or third year. 
Recueil de Mid. Vet. for April and May , 1851. 
Investigations into the Functions of Respiration and 
Nutrition through a comparative Analysis of 
Arterial and Venous Blood. 
By M. Clement, 
Chef de Service de Chimie a l’Ecole Nationale V^terinaire d’Alfort. 
From a series of analytical experiments and calculations, the 
author of this inquiry has come to the following conclusions : — 
1. That the lung is the seat of a real combustion. 
2. That the constituent of the blood undergoing combustion 
is the albumen ; and that in the combustion carbon and hydrogen 
are imparted to the oxygen of the air. 
3. That the products of combustion are water, carbonic acid, 
and fibrine, or albumen altered into fibrine. 
4. That if nothing but this took place, the venous blood, 
which in its passage through the lungs has been deprived of 
water and carbonic acid, ought to form an arterial blood con- 
taining less than it of these two ingredients, which is not the 
case. 
5. That the water produced by combustion enters the arterial 
