670 
ME.  J.  LISTEE  ON  THE  EAELT  STAOE.S  OE  INELA^BIATION. 
scope,  but  could  discover  no  difference  between  them  in  the  adhesiveness  of  their  cor- 
puscles ; as  indicated  hy  the  time  of  formation  of  the  rouleaux,  then* * * §  mode  of  grouping, 
and  the  tenacity  with  which  the  discs  composing  them  adhered  when  they  were  stretched. 
The  results  of  these  experiments  appear  decidedly  confii-matoiy  of  the  conclusion  with 
reference  to  which  they  were  instituted. 
No  mention  has  been  hitherto  made  of  the  appearance  presented  by  the  colourless 
corpuscles  in  an  mritated  part.  It  is  well  known  that  their  numbers,  in  proportion  to 
the  red  ones,  vary  very  much  in  different  frogs,  and  it  so  happened  that  in  the  two  on 
which  the  first  mustard  experiments  were  performed  they  showed  themselves  but  little ; 
nor  are  they  at  all  conspicuous  when  the  circulation  has  been  arrested  by  hgature ; but 
in  most  cases  in  which  irritation  is  applied  to  the  web  while  the  blood  is  ch’culating 
through  it,  one  of  the  earliest  abnormal  appearances  is  that  of  white  corpuscles  adhe- 
ring in  large  numbers  to  the  walls  of  arteries,  capillaries  and  veins,  as  first  described 
and  accurately  figured  by  Dr.  Williams*.  This  remarkable  phenomenon,  though  of 
itself  clear  proof  of  an  alteration  in  the  properties  of  the  blood  in  an  mitated  part, 
has,  strangely  enough,  attracted  little  attention  from  other  obseiwers.  It  is  e'sidently 
analogous  to  the  change  which  the  red  discs  experience  under  similar  cu’cumstances.  I 
find  that  the  account  commonly  given  of  the  white  corpuscles  in  cu’culation  in  the 
vessels  of  the  frog’s  web,  viz.  that  they  may  be  seen  rolling  slowly  along  the  walls  of  the 
arteries  and  veins,  and  sometimes  sticking  to  them,  though  intended  to  apply  to  the 
state  of  health  f,  really  describes  a condition  of  a slight  amount  of  mitation,  such  as  is 
exceedingly  apt  to  be  induced  by  a variety  of  causes;]].  In  perfect  health  the  colourless 
corpuscles  are  as  free  from  adhesiveness  within  the  vessels  as  the  red  discs,  but  like 
them  assume  that  property  in  a degree  proportionate  to  the  amount  of  mitation  to  which 
the  part  has  been  subjected.  When  the  irritation  has  been  very  slight,  the  white  cor- 
puscles, which  are  susceptible  of  much  greater  adhesiveness  than  the  red  (as  we  learn 
from  examining  blood  outside  the  body^),  acquire  some  tendency  to  stick  to  the  vascu. 
lar  parietes,  while  the  red  discs  still  move  on  in  a manner  generally  regarded  as  con- 
sistent with  health,  though  really  lagging  slightly  behind  the  hquor  sanguinis,  and  con- 
* Vide  op.  cit. 
f Mr.  Whaeton  Jones,  in  describing  the  healthy  circulation  in  the  bat’s  wing,  speaks  of  the  colourless 
corpuscles  as  “rolling  or  sliding  sluggishly  along  the  walls  of  the  vessels,”  “both  in  arteries  and  veins.” 
He  also  describes,  in  the  following  passage,  increased  adhesiveness  as  resulting  from  irritation.  “ Towards 
the  end  of  a protracted  sitting,  after  the  web  had  been  much  irritated,  I have  seen,  in  the  venous  radicles 
especially,  colourless  corpuscles  accumrdated  in  great  numbers,  as  we  so  often  see  them  in  the  frog.”  But  no 
stress  is  laid  on  this  fact  as  bearing  upon  the  nature  of  inflammation  (see  “ Observations  on  the  state  of  the 
Blood  and  the  Blood-vessels  in  Inflammation,”  by  T.  Whaeton  Jones,  E.E.S.,  Medico-Chiriu’gical  Trans- 
actions, vol.  xxxvi.  1858).  Dr.  Williams,  supposing  that  the  white  corpuscles  were  always  adhesive  within 
the  vessels  in  health,  was  led  to  attribute  their  abnormal  accumulation  in  an  irritated  part  to  local  fivsh 
formation  of  those  bodies.  Vide  op.  cit. 
:{;  It  has  been  mentioned  in  the  note  to  p.  660,  that  this  efiect  is  peculiarly  liable  to  be  produced  in  con- 
sequence of  the  vicinity  of  the  warm  hand. 
§ See  page  619. 
