: gQ Mr. W. Brande’s Chemical Researches on the Blood , 
ness throughout. At longer periods after a meal, the quan- 
tity of chyle begins to diminish, the appearance of the fluid in 
the duct is similar to that of milk and water; and lastly, 
where the animal has fasted for twenty-four hours or longer, 
the thoracic duct contains a transparent fluid which is pure 
lymph. 
A. The chyle has the following properties. 
1. When collected without any admixture of blood, it is an 
opaque fluid of a perfectly white colour, without smell, and 
having a slightly salt taste, accompanied by a degree of 
sweetness. 
2. The colour of litmus is not affected by it, nor that of 
paper stained with turmeric, but it slowly changes the blue 
colour of infusion of violets to green. 
3. Its specific gravity is somewhat greater than that of 
water, but less than that of the blood ; this, however, is pro- 
bably liable to much variation. 
4. In about ten minutes after it is removed from the duct, 
it assumes the appearance of a stiff jelly, which in the course 
of twenty-four hours gradually separates into two parts, pro- 
ducing a firm and contracted coagulum, surrounded by a 
transparent colourless fluid. These spontaneous changes, 
which I have observed in every instance where the chyle was 
examined at a proper period after taking food, are very simi- 
lar to the coagulation of the blood and its subsequent separa- 
tion into serum and erassamentum ; they are also retarded 
and accelerated by similar means. 
B. 1. The coagulated portion bears a nearer resemblance 
to the caseous part of milk than to the fibrine of the blood. 
2. It is rapidly dissolved by the caustic and subcarbonated 
