ARSENIC. 
§§ 763. 764-] 
minutes it again rose to 127 mm. It is remarkable, in the light of the effects 
of arsenical beer, that Hebra and other dermatologists have given in skin 
diseases, during many months, large quantities of arsenic without evil result. 
§ 763. Elimination of Arsenic.—Arsenic is separated especially by 
the urine, 1 then through the bile, and by the skin and hair. The 
eruption often observed on the skin has been referred to the local action 
of small quantities of arsenic in this way eliminated. It is found in 
the urine first after from five to six hours, but the elimination from a 
single dose is not finished till a period of from five to eight days ; it has 
often been looked for twelve days after taking it, but very seldom found ; 
but there are cases recorded in which the elimination of arsenic by the 
urine has continued long after the toxic dose. Probably the case related 
by Wood (Bost. Med. mid Surg. J ., 1893) is the longest on record, viz. 
ninety-three days after a single large dose, which produced the usual acute 
symptoms and was followed by paralysis. Such instances may give rise 
to considerable difficulty in interpreting cases in which after death only 
small quantities of arsenic have been discovered. 
According to Vitali, the arsenic in the urine is not free, but probably 
displaces phosphorus in phospho-glyceric acid ; possibly it may also 
replace phosphorus in lecithin. 
§ 764. Elimination of Organic Arsenic Compounds. — There may 
be cases where, for medico-legal purposes, it will be of importance to 
know whether a person has been treated with organic arsenic com¬ 
pounds ; evidence on this point may be obtained from the urine. Ernst 
Sieburg ( Zeilsch. 'physiol. Chem., 1916) has found the following sub¬ 
stances in the urine after repeated intravenous injections of salvarsan 
into a syphilitic patient:—p-amino-phenol, o-acety-amino-phenyl hydrogen 
sulphate, oxycarbanil, amino-hydroxy-phenyl-arsinic acid C 6 H 8 0 4 NAs, 
hydroxy-phenyl-arsinic acid C 6 H 7 0 4 As, with inorganic arsenates and 
arsenites. Sieburg therefore believes that salvarsan is broken up in 
the system according to the following scheme :— 
As 2 0 5 
1 An old experiment of Orfila’s has some practical bearings, and may be cited 
here. A dog was treated by -12 grm. of arsenious acid, and supplied plentifully 
with liquid to drink ; his urine, analysed from time to time during ten days, gave 
abundant evidences of arsenic. On killing the animal by hanging on the tenth day, 
no arsenic could be detected in any of the organs of the body ; it had been, as it 
were, washed out. 
