COAGULATION OF THE BLOOD. 
431 
The'annual dinner took place in the evening, at the London 
Coffee House, Bishopsgate Street, the Presid ent in the chair. 
The party was not so large as on some former occasions, but 
it lacked no spirit of conviviality nor good feeling. The 
festivities were kept up to a late hour, when all dispersed 
much gratified with the occasion which had brought them 
together. 
Extracts from British and Foreign Journals. 
THE CROONIAN LECTURE ON THE COAGULATION OF THE 
BLOOD, DELIVERED BEFORE THE ROYAL SOCIETY, 
JUNE 11, 1863. 
By Joseph Lister, Esq., F.R.S., F.R.C.S. 
(Continued from p. 318.) 
It is a very curious question—What is the cause of the 
blood remaining so much longer fluid in some vessels than in 
others ? I believe that we must accept it simply as an ulti¬ 
mate fact, that just as the brain loses its vital properties 
earlier than the ganglia of the heart, so the heart and princi¬ 
pal vascular trunks lose theirs sooner than the small vessels 
of the viscera, or than more superficial vessels, be they large 
or small. We can see a final cause for this, so to speak. So 
long as the heart is acting, circulation will be sure to go on 
in the heart and principal trunks; whereas, on the contrary, 
the more superficial parts are liable to temporary stagnation, 
and occasionally to what amounts to practical severance from 
vascular and nervous connection with the rest of the body; 
and it is, so to speak, of great importance that the blood 
should not coagulate so speedily in the vessels of a limb thus 
circumstanced as it does in the heart after it has ceased to 
beat. Were it not for this provision, the surgeon would be 
unable to apply a tourniquet without fear of coagulation 
occurring in the vessels of the limb. As an illustration of 
the importance of a knowledge of these facts, I may mention 
a case that once occurred in my own practice. I was asked 
by a surgeon in a country district to amputate an arm of 
which he despaired. The brachial artery had been wounded, 
as well as veins and nerves, and at last, being foiled with the 
haemorrhage, he wound a long bandage round the limb at the 
