ON POISONING BY CONCENTRATED ACIDS, ETC. 133 
acid which had not been absorbed, and that a part of the in- 
testine contained the same free acid. — Rapport Judiciaire, 
du 7 Janvier, 1838. 
These facts demonstrate, in our estimation, that in poison- 
ing by concentrated acids, the acid is not absorbed, and that 
it is necessary, in cases of poisoning by the acids, to destroy 
them by means of an absorbing substance. 
We may be told, it is true, that here we do not operate in 
a capsule, in a retort or alembic, (it is the common remark of 
all those who oppose the application of chemistry to medi- 
cine.) We reply to it, that poisoning has occurred from 
quantities of acids sufficient to occasion death ; the antidote 
has been administered; the patient has been saved: what 
more can be asked? 
We shall terminate here what we have to say upon the 
subject, and we await, in order to believe that we ought not 
to administer the alkalies or the alkaline carbonates, in cases 
of poisoning by the concentrated acids, the demonstration by 
positive facts, 1st, that it is possible to save the patient by 
other methods. 2d, that these methods are preferable. 3d. 
that the acids taken into the stomach are entirely absorbed, 
which appears not to have taken place, if we rely on the ex- 
amination of organs taken from subjects who have perished 
by their introduction. 
Journ. de Chimie Med. 
