404 
PHOSPHORUS AS A POISON. 
The right side of their heart was flaccid and empty, the left 
side firmly contracted. The lungs and most of the abdo- 
minal organs were found somewhat congested. The mucous 
membranes of the stomach were highly vascular, and in both 
cases the organ contained a quantity of mucus and half- 
digested food. It is worthy of remark that the gall-bladders 
were quite empty, just as was found in the case of the kitten 
experimented upon by Dr. Harley and myself. The mem- 
branes of the brain and spinal cord in all three cases pre- 
sented the same slightly congested appearance. On ana- 
lysing the contents of the stomachs, I detected only a trace 
of phosphoric acid, while in the brain, liver, heart, lungs, 
and muscles, I found it in a more appreciable quantity. 
‘‘In order to ascertain the effects of phosphorus a3 a 
poison, when administered in large doses, I gave a full- 
grown healthy cat, at half-past four p.m., sixty grains of 
phosphor paste. Next morning it was found dead, and in a 
state of rigor mortis. On. examining the body, the same 
appearances were present as in the previously cited examples, 
and phosphoric acid was found in the blood as well as in the 
heart, liver, lungs, and muscles. 
“ From the results of these experiments, I conclude that 
phosphorus may act, in the first instance, as an irritant 
poison in exciting inflammation of the mucous membrane 
of the stomach, not being so active an irritant, however, 
as either arsenic or corrosive sublimate ; but from the 
symptoms immediately preceding death, I incline to the 
opinion that this poison bears considerable analogy to 
strychnine in the manner in which it acts upon the ani- 
mal frame — not by a direct action upon the nervous system, 
as was formerly supposed, but by preventing the assimi- 
lation of oxygen by the constituents of the blood. From 
the analyses of the blood, flesh, brain, heart, liver, and lungs 
of the animals poisoned by phosphorus, we saw that phos- 
phoric acid was present in abnormal quantity. It there- 
fore appears that the phosphorus enters into combination 
with oxygen in the stomach, to form phosphoric acid, and 
it is doubtless as such absorbed into the blood. The in- 
flammatory action in the mucous membrane of the stomach 
would most probably take place during the slow transfor- 
mation of the phosphorus into phosphoric acid in that 
organ. Dr. Harley has shown, by direct experiment, that 
strychnine and some other poisons possess the property of 
so modifying the organic constituents of the blood as to 
render them incapable of absorbing oxygen, and exhaling 
carbonic acid, and thus becoming fitted for the purpose of 
