280 
Q. A. BANHAM. 
0.8°, therefore we should avoid, as far as possible, our examina¬ 
tion during digestion. 
Assimilation of food materials only influences the tempera¬ 
ture when disease commences from a disturbance in that process. 
Colin observed that when a fat horse, weighing 410 kilogrammes, 
(820 lbs.), fasted for a month, it lost 80 kilogrammes, (160 lbs), 
but the temperature remained unaltered. 
In the German “ Woehenschrift fur Landwirthschaft,” von 
Prof. Birnbaum, v. p. 304, Pflug says that if a horse be kept for 
a long time in a temperature of 0° c., with bad nourishment, its 
temperature falls to 36° c. 
Gerlach remarks that the temperature commences to sink five 
minutes after a horse has taken water, and within half an hour it 
sank 0.8° and remained so for about four hours, after which a 
reaction followed, with an increase of the temperature. 
Various medicinal agents have more or less influence on the 
temperature of the body. Alkalies , salts , (natrium sulphuricum, 
or kali nitricum) and weak acids lower the temperature; but 
counter-irritants and soothing medicaments, as plumbum aceti- 
cum , tartarus stibiatus , veratrum album , and especially digitalis , 
act most energetically in this direction, (Hirtz). A decrease of 
from 2.5° to 3.5° has been obtained by tolerably small doses of 
these agents. If larger doses are administered, the temperature 
sinks still more, then it fluctuates, and then sinks still lower, until 
death closes the scene. If tartarus stibiatus be continuously 
given, it retains the temperature about 2° to 2.5° below the nor¬ 
mal point, (Ackermann). Alcohol , when given in small doses, 
acts as an irritant and raises the temperature; but if adminis¬ 
tered in large doses, and especially if long continued, it produces 
a decrease of temperature, (Bouvier). Acidum carbolicum more 
so. Acidum salicylicum , when administered in large quantities, 
produce a temperature 1.7° to 2° below the normal, (Statthaus). 
The narcotic agents, especially chloroform and ether, produce a 
temporary and quick rise, followed by a diminution of the tem¬ 
perature. By etherization the temperature is lowered about 2.5° 
to 3°, (Vogely). Chloral liydr. is first followed by increase, 
which, in about eighteen or twenty minutes, is replaced by a de- 
