SYNOPSIS OF CONTINENTAL VETERINARY JOURNALS. 551 
fire was burning; but in spite of all care the number of 
victims increased so rapidly that by five p.m. only four 
sheep remained alive, of which two died in the night and 
two recovered. Thus, out of fifty-one sheep bathed forty- 
nine died in less than twentyffour hours. Some days after 
the proprietor, having applied some of the arsenical liquid, 
which had been preserved, by means of friction to the 
affected parts of two new sheep, these also succumbed. 
What could be the cause of this poisoning ? I had done 
as I was accustomed to do, and I have never had an acci¬ 
dent, though I have already subjected to the same treatment 
very nearly two thousand sheep belonging to different owners. 
Analysis of the solution, of which I knew only early in 
January last, showed that in place of sulphate of zinc it 
contained sulphate of soda. This must have been the cause 
of the accident, for the sulphate of zinc, acting as an astrin¬ 
gent, is not absorbed and prevents absorption of the arsenic, 
whilst the solution of sulphate of soda, which acts on the 
skin the same way as on the mucous membrane of the stomach 
and intestines, though certainly with less intensity, is ab¬ 
sorbed by endosmosis, together with the arsenic with which 
it is combined. The lesions which I met with were 
not nearly so complicated as those produced by arsenic intro¬ 
duced into the alimentary canal. Ought not the druggist to 
be responsible for the damage done under these circum¬ 
stances ? Hitherto the owner, whose animals I continue 
to attend, has not brought any action for damages. 
M. H. Bouley , to whom the above was addressed, made it 
the subject of the following reflections :—“ The most inte¬ 
resting observation which the exigencies of practice have 
allowed M. Beucler to make raises many questions, of which 
some ought to be studied, that they may have experimental 
solution. The first is the reactions which occur in the 
“ regulation-bath of Teissier,” in which the protosulphate of 
iron or sulphate of zinc are mixed with arsenic in the 
proportion of ten parts of the first salt or five parts of the 
second to one part of the acid. According to chemists of 
high position whom I have consulted on this point, a certain 
quantity of arsenite of iron or of arsenite of zinc (both in¬ 
soluble salts) is formed in the bath, so that the combination 
of astringent salts with arsenic would not only prevent 
absorption of the toxic agent by the skin by constringing 
the pores and vessels of that membrane, but also would 
reduce the chances of poisoning by reducing to a smaller 
proportion the quantity of the toxic agent in solution in the 
bath. When sulphate of soda is substituted for the co rre- 
