602 
DE. PAYY ON STJGAE FOEMATION IN THE LITBE. 
explanation. After the division of the spinal cord, the temperature of the animal rapidly 
falls. In one case I noticed in a rabbit 3| hours after the operation, that the tempera- 
ture of the rectum was only 67°. This low degree of temperature at the time of death 
renders iYie post-mortem production of sugar so slow a process, that it is easily recognized 
in its true light. 
Maintaining artificially the heat of the animal by exposure to a high temperature 
after division of the spinal cord, altogether alters the result. Thus, a rabbit in which 
the spinal cord had been divided just below the phrenics, was placed in an atmosphere 
where the thermometer stood at 88°. In three hours’ time, when it was killed by 
pithing, the temperature of its rectum was 104°. The liver behaved precisely as if the 
animal had been suddenly killed in its ordinary state, sugar being found, after an ordi- 
narily conducted examination, to its usual extent. 
It has also not escaped the observation of Bekxaed, in experimenting on the frog, 
that, according to the temperature of the animal at the time of death, the liver is found 
with or without sugar after an ordinarily conducted examination. In the ‘ Comptes 
Eendus’ of the Academy of Sciences, March 1857, he mentions this fact, and refers it to 
a variation in the activity of the circulation, produced by the high and low temperature 
leading to an increase or decrease, or even arrest of the glycogenic fimction. I had 
obtained results corresponding with those of Beenaed before I was aware he had under- 
taken his experiments. Frogs in good condition, in which the liver is large, pale- 
coloured, and exceedingly rich in amyloid substance, were exposed for two hours to an 
atmosphere heated to 90°. An examination of the livers in the usual way afforded a 
decided indication of the presence of sugar. In other frogs, without exposure to the 
elevated temperature, the livers similarly examined gave no reaction with the Barreswil 
solution. Whilst repeating these experiments, I accidentally met with a result for 
which I was formerly at a loss to account. Some frogs that had been exposed to heat 
happened to be placed aside in my laboratory for a quarter of an hour before they were 
killed. Their livers, being examined, yielded scarcely an indication of a trace of sugar*. 
Time had been given for the temperature to fall ; and from what has preceded, it will 
now be seen that the absence or presence of sugar in these experiments depends upon 
the influence that a high or low temperature has been shown to exercise over the post- 
mortem change that occurs in the liver. 
I have found the livers of the oyster and mussel, when these animals are in a fresh 
and healthy state, to be free from the presence of sugar. But the livers contain a large 
quantity of the amyloid substance, and should the animals have been alloAved to die, or 
have been kept for some time, sugar may be encountered to a large extent. The same 
is the result when the livers are removed and moderately heated a short time before the 
examination is made. 
Immediately underneath the shell of the mussel [Mytilus edulis) is a layer — the 
mantle — which is highly charged with the same amyloid substance that is met with in 
the liver. When the animal is in good condition, this layer is thick and opakely white 
