580 
Constitution  of  Albumenoids. 
j  Am.  Jour.  Pharm- 
1      Nov.,  1882. 
ceeded  in  breaking  those  ii])  into  two  or  three  distinct  substances^ 
possessing  the  properties  of  albuminous  products,  and  a  well-defined 
ferment.  The  question  arises,  for  what  purpose  are  all  these  albumi- 
nous liquids  accompanied  by  these  ferments?  What  relation  exists 
between  the  abundance  of  coagulable  animal  matter,  destined  appar- 
ently to  furnish  materials  for  the  building  up  of  organs,  and  the  small 
quantity  of  these  ferments  the  presence  of  which  appears  to  indicate 
the  approaching  destruction  of  the  unstable  compounds  with  which 
they  are  associated  ?  Whence  do  these  ferments  come,  what  becomes 
of  them,  and  what  part  do  they  play  ?  Such  questions  are  certainly 
of  considerable  interest ;  for  these  ferments  are  observed  in  the  serum 
of  the  blood  .of  all  animals,  in  the  white  and  the  yelk  of  eggs,  and  in 
milk ;  that  is,  in  all  liquids  destined  for  the  formation  or  reparation  of 
the  organs  of  animals. 
Long  ago  Thenard,  recognizing  the  singularly  destructive  action 
exercised  upon  peroxide  of  hydrogen  by  certain  bodies,  such  as  divided 
silver,  was  led  to  compare  their  manner  of  action  in  this  case  with 
that  of  ferments.  In  fact,  the  analogy  is  striking  between  beer  yeast,, 
which  in  the  presence  of  sugar  destroys  it  and  converts  it  into  alcohol 
and  carbonic  acid,  and  fibrin,  which  converts  peroxide  of  hydrogen 
into  oxygen  and  water.  Neither  beer  yeast  nor  fibrin  appears  to  ope- 
rate in  virtue  of  a  chemical  action,  or  it  would  have  a  part  to  play.. 
But  yeast  operates  in  virtue  of  a  vital  phenomenon :  would  this  be  the 
case  with  fibrin  ?  Of  this  we  are  ignorant,  and  although  our  ideas 
upon  the  subject  of  ferments  have  been  much  modified  since  the  inves- 
tigation of  peroxide  of  hydrogen  by  Thenard,  we  are  not  yet  in  a 
position  to  explain  how  fibrin  decomposes  peroxide  of  hydrogen 
apparently  without  borrowing  anything  from  it  or  yielding  anything 
to  it. 
This  question,  the  interest  of  which  has  not  escaped  physiologists,, 
has  been  advanced  a  step  by  M.  Bechamp.  The  fibrin  of  the  blood 
and  the  oxygen  condensed  in  the  globules  may  possibly  have  a  part  to 
play  in  the  complex  phenomena  of  respiration  allied  to  this  singular 
action  upon  peroxide  of  hydrogen  which  no  other  animal  matter 
exhibits.  M.  Dumas  states  that  he  himself  formerly  sought  unsuc- 
cessfully to  ascertain  whether  arterial  blood  contained  peroxide  of 
hydrogen,  but  he  would  not  be  surprised  if  some  more  able  experi- 
menter were  to  detect  its  presence. 
When  fibrin  is  treated  with  dilute  hydrochloric  acid  it  swells  and 
