DINITRO-BENZOL. 
203 
§ 254-1 
blue. He was short of breath, and after the day’s work experienced 
aching of the forearms and legs and tingling of the fingers. The urine 
was black in colour, of sp. gr. 1024 ; it was examined spectroscopically 
by Dr MacMunn, who reported the black colour as due neither to 
indican, nor to blood, nor bile, but to be caused by some pigment be¬ 
longing to the aromatic series. The patient’s sight had been failing 
since the previous Christmas. Vision in the right eye was left ; 
both optic papillae were somewhat pale. In each eye there was a central 
scotoma for red, and contraction of the field (see diagram). The man 
gradually gave up the work, and ultimately seems to have recovered. 
It is, however, interesting to note that, after having left the work for 
some weeks, he went back for a single day to the “ mixing,” and was 
taken very ill, being insensible and delirious for five hours. 
§ 254. The Blood in Nitro-benzol Poisoning. —The effect on the 
blood has been specially studied by Huber. 1 The blood of rabbits 
poisoned by dinitro-benzol is of a dark chocolate colour, and the micro¬ 
scope shows destruction of the red corpuscles ; the amount of destruction 
may be gathered from the following :—The blood corpuscles of a rabbit 
before the experiment numbered 5,888,000 per cubic centimetre ; a day 
after the experiment, 4,856,000 ; a day later, 1,004,000 ; on the third 
day the rabbit died. 
In one rabbit, although the corpuscles sank to 1,416,000, yet re¬ 
covery took place. 
Dr MacMunn 2 has examined specimens of blood from two of Mr 
Snell’s patients ; he found a distinct departure from the normal; the red 
corpuscles were smaller than usual, about 5 or 6 /x in diameter, and the 
appearances were like those seen in pernicious anaemia. Huber, in some 
of his experiments on animals, found a spectroscopic change in the 
blood, viz. certain absorption bands, one in the red between C and D, 
and two in the green between D and E ; the action of reducing agents 
on this dinitro-benzol blood, as viewed in a spectroscope provided with 
a scale in which C = 48, D = 62, and E = 80-5, was as follows :— 
Dinitro- Bands. 
In Red. 
In Green. 
50-52 
62-66 
70-77 
After NH 4 S0 4 . 
53-55 
62-66 
70-77 
„ NH 3 . 
54-58 
60-65 
70-77 
„ nh 4 so 4 +nh 3 . 
52-55 
60-65 
’70-77 
Taking the symptoms as a whole, there has been noted : a blue 
colour of the lips, not infrequently extending over the whole face, and 
2 Op. dt. 
1 Op. cit. 
