90 
THE THANATOPHIDIA OF INDIA. 
several interesting experiments as well as cases of snake-bite in 
which the results were satisfactory. 
This mode of treating poisoning not only by snake-bites but 
by chloroform, hydrocyanic acid, and other toxic agents, among 
which that of pyaemia is mentioned, and that of cholera suggested, 
has evidently heen received with much confidence in Australia, 
and the matter is fully and ably discussed in the paper in question. 
The subject also of the structural changes in the blood to 
which I have already frequently adverted, and which were 
described by Professor Halford in 1867,* is also referred 
to with some further explanations, which so far as I can 
understand it, modify the views at first expressed by Dr. 
Halford. In the paper to which I have referred, Dr. Halford 
says of those corpuscles, “ he had never seen those cells before 
death , but he believed the organic germinal matter of the 
serpent’s poison to be the efficient agent, and the post-mortem 
changes in the blood to be in some way connected with a meta. 
morphosis of the fibrine of that fluid which so far as coagulation 
was concerned, appeared destroyed by snake-poison. It was 
also the case in death from hydrocyanic acid.” I had certainly 
understood from Dr. Halford’s former writings that these cor¬ 
puscles were an ante-mortem condition, a development of cells 
in the living blood “ at the expense of the oxygen absorbed 
into the blood during inspiration, and hence the gradual 
decrease and ultimate extinction of combustion and chemical 
change in every other part of the body, followed by coldness, 
sleepiness, insensibility, slow breathing, and death.” If I do 
not misunderstand him, in one paper Dr. Halford describes the 
formation of the cells as an ante-mortem change, and the actual 
cause of death; but in the later paper, I read that these cells 
are never seen before death. My examinations have been con¬ 
* “ When a person is mortally bitten by the Cobra-di-capella, molecules of living 
‘ germinal’ matter are thrown into the blood, and speedily grow into cells, and as 
rapidly multiply, so that in a few hours millions upon millions are produced at the 
expense, as far as I can at present see, of the oxygen absorbed into the blood during 
inspiration ; lienee the gradual decrease, and ultimate extinction of combustion and 
chemical change in every other part of the body, followed by coldness, sleepiness, 
insensibility, slow breathing, and death. 
“ The colls which thus render in so short a time the blood unfit to support life, are 
circular, with a diameter on the average of tyVtr of an inch. They contain a nearly 
round nucleus of vsutt of an inch in breadth, which, when further magnified, is 
seen to contain other still more minute spherules of living ‘ germinal’ matter. In 
addition to this, the application of magenta reveals a minute coloured spot at some 
part of the circumference of the cell. This, besides its size, distinguishes it from 
the white pus or lymph corpuscle. 
“ Thus then it would seem that, as the vegetable cell requires for its growth in¬ 
organic food and the liberation of oxygen, so the animal cell requires for its growth 
organic food and the absorption of oxygen. Its food is present in the blood, and it 
meets the oxygen in the lungs ; thus the whole blood becomes disorganized, and 
nothing is found after death but dark fluid blood, the fluidity indicating its loss of 
fibrine, the dark colour its want of oxygen, which it readily absorbs on exposure 
after death. 
“ Let it not be thought that microscopic particles are unable to produce such great 
and rapid changes. It is well known, and I have frequently timed it with my class, 
that a teaspoonful of human saliva will, when shaken with a like quantity of de¬ 
coction of starch, convert the whole of the latter into sugar in a little less than one 
minute. If ptyaline, the active principle of saliva, exerts this power at most in a 
few minutes, then surely the active principle of the secretion of the serpent’s poison 
gland may exert an infinitely greater power in as many hours. It results then that a 
person dies slowly asphyxiated by deprivation of oxygen, in whatever other way the 
poison may also act, and so far as the ordinary examination of the blood goes, the 
post-mortem appearances are similar to those seen after drowning and suffocation. 
“ I have many reasons for believing that the materies morbi of cholera is a nearly 
allied animal poison. If so, may we not hope to know something definite of the 
poisons of hydrophobia, small-pox, scarlet fever, and indeed of all zymotic diseases ?” 
— British Medical Journal, July 20th, 1867, p. 43. 
“ The following was the result of numerous experiments on dogs and cats. Blood 
soon drawn from an animal bitten by a snake contains a larger amount of nebulous 
or finely granular matter than is usually seen. After the lapse of one hour this 
nebulous matter is much increased in quantity, lying in the intervals of the red 
corpuscles, and presently it breaks up into small masses, out of which the cell is 
gradually evolved. In two hours after the bite, the cells may be seen in great 
numbers but very indistinct. From this tune every further microscopic observa¬ 
tion shows them in great abundance ; and from the sixth to the twelfth hour they 
may be seen in perfection, macula and nucleus included. "Whilst this is taking 
place the nebirlous matter disappears ; the nebulous matter must therefore be re- 
garded as the germinal matter out of which the cells are formed. At this time the 
cell wall is extremely delicate, the macula very plain as a bright particle, and the 
nucleus either single, reniform, double, triple, or multiple. 
“ It would appear that the cells are now increasing in number by division of their 
nuclei, and the minute particles, having the vibratory movement of molecules in 
fluid, may be seen between the nucleus and coll wall. On one occasion we watched 
fined to the poisoned blood, during the life of the animal or 
immediately after its deatli, and I confess I have failed alto¬ 
gether to find them; as post-mortem changes, they are no 
doubt very important and interesting, but as such, I think, 
they can hardly he regarded as the cause of death. 
My impression is still very strong that death from snake¬ 
bite, when it takes place within a short period, as it always 
does in an animal thoroughly bitten by a Cobra, is due, not to 
any organic changes in the germinal matter or cellular structures 
of the blood, for which indeed there is often not time. But 
as life may be suddenly destroyed by such poisons as hydro¬ 
cyanic acid before any blood change can possibly occur, so in 
the case of the bite of a vigorous Cobra in a small animal, death 
occurs almost, if not quite as instantaneously, but by its direct 
influence on the centres of nerve force, by exerting an antagonistic 
force, one that is incompatible in short with those which regu¬ 
late and govern the phenomena of life. I have already ex¬ 
pressed an opinion which I repeat, that when death occurs 
more slowly, and when time is given for blood changes to take 
place, such do probably occur as in other toxsemise, and 
that the man or animal dies therefrom in a similar manner 
to that in which he or it might have perished from any other 
form of blood poisoning. 
May 29 th, 1869. 
Present, Dr. Fayrer, Dr. J. Ewart, Professor of Physiology, 
Mr. Sceva. 
Experiment No. 1. 
At 2.48 p.m., the femoral vein of a middling-sized healthy 
Dog was carefully exposed, and one drachm of liquor 
ammonise, sp. gr. ’959 B. P., was injected into it with the 
for upwards of lialf ail flour a constant revolution within the cell of a particle cor¬ 
responding in all particulars to a macula. This particle passed regularly round 
the nucleus at an uniform rate, revolving both in the direction of and against the 
current of the fluid in which the cell was flowing, reminding one of the movements 
seen in vallisneria, &c. Twenty-four hours after the bite, the cells attain their 
greatest size, and, supposing the animal then dead, have probably ceased multiply¬ 
ing, and are simply living or perhaps growing, the nucleus being usually single, 
the macula extremely distinct, and the cell very large. It is not uncommon at this 
time and later to see a cup-shaped hiatus in the cell wall from which the macula 
has escaped. The cells may be seen in the blood for many days, their presence 
seeming to be preservative against putrefaction. Where they have most room, as 
in the venae cavse, cranial sinuses, and cavities of the heart, they attain the greatest 
size and most circular form. In every instance the cell wall is very elastic, and 
accommodates itself to surrounding pressure. 
“ To ascertain how soon after inoculation these cells appear, is a matter of some 
difficulty. It is not necessary to suppose that at first they are very numerous ; 
and in order to detect them so early, it might require fifty or a hundred microscopes 
and observers at work at the same instant. Still, from their having been seen two 
hours after the bite, and from all we know of the rapidity with which new forma¬ 
tions occur, both in health and disease, it is doubtless extremely soon. Of oue 
thing we are sure—viz., that the nebulous germinal matter from which they spring 
is within a few minutes diffused all over the body ; for supposing an animal to die 
in five minutes, and hence all circulation stopped, the cells are as readily seen in its 
blood a few hours after death as if it had lived as many hours as we say minutes. 
The macula is doubtless a particle of germinal matter ; but whether it is to be 
regarded as that from which the whole cell has sprung, or whether it has been de¬ 
tached from the nucleus and is destined for independent existence, it is difficult to 
say. The fact that it is almost invariably large when the cell is small, and small 
when the cell is large, favours the first view. Perhaps the most important point 
must be left still undecided. Has the blood built up these cells, directly or indi¬ 
rectly, from the germinal matter of the serpent ? The answer to this question the 
Professor would endeavour to give at a future meeting ; but in either case the 
result was the same, storing up of force in the new growth, at the expense of the 
nutritive properties of the blood, and by perversion of those chemical changes 
necessary to the maintenance of the life of the infected animal. 
“ That the germinal matter exists in a state of extreme minuteness, the following 
experiment shows : —A cat, being with young, was inoculated with the poison, and 
dying in three hours, her four kittens were removed from the womb. They were 
dead, and the blood of all contained the foreign cells, as did that of the mother. 
To pass from the cat to the kittens, the germinal matter must have penetrated the 
delicate membrane covering the tufts of the foetal vessels. If the poison of serpents 
can thus readily be traced through the body, and from parent to offspring, why 
should not the path of all infections be tracked p Some months ago it was stated 
that it was conjectured that a child had been bitten by a snake. No doubt need 
ever exist for the future ; a drop of blood will always furnish the necessary evidence. 
He trusted the subject would not be let fall to the ground in Victoria, for it would 
assuredly be taken up at home. It had been to him a matter of surprise that, 
while this colony very property appoints men to survey her coasts, explore her skies, 
and the ground beneath her feet, no one systematically explores her diseases, a sub¬ 
ject in which the rich and poor, the living and those about to live, are equally and 
deeply concerned, and in comparison with which many other subjects that excite 
her people are trifles .” — British Medical Journal, December 21st, 1867, p. 163. 
