484. QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Jun, 1902. 
Sudoriferous glands are attached to the skin, consisting of a curled tube 
lying in the chorion and a spiral duct passing up through the derma and 
epidermis, lined with epithelium. Their function is the regulation of animal 
heat, and also are connected with excretion of urea, &c. 
The sebaceous glands empty into the hair follicles or on the skin indepen- 
dently. They consist of vesicles filled with fatty and epithelial tissue, opening 
into a common duct. Their function is lubrication and protection as’ well as 
preservation of the elasticity of the hair and other epidermal appendages. 
The horny parts.—These comprise the chestnuts, ergot, and hoofs. 
Funcrions or THE SKIN. 
1. The skin everywhere clothes the external surface of the body, protecting 
the underlying parts from injury. 
2. It affords support and protection to the terminations of the sensory 
nerves, which render it an important sense organ. 
3, It is a bad conductor of heat, and thus serves to preserve the heat of 
the body. 
4, it is supplied with a large extent of capillary blood-vessels, and thus 
by its means a large surface of blood is exposed to the cooling influence of 
surrounding bodies. The dilatation or contraction of the blood-vessels 
supplying the skin will help to regulate the heat of the body. 
5. The sweat glands which it contains make it an important excretory 
organ. 
6. It plays a subsidiary part as an organ of respiration. 
7. Under exceptional circumstances, absorption takes places from its 
surface. 
Curanrous Respiration anp ABSORPTION. 
The skin of the domesticated animals performs several very important 
functions. Besides being a protective envelope, the importance of the skin 
as a respiratory organ is far from inconsiderable, very appreciable quantities 
of carbonic acid being exhaled hourly by the external surface of the skin. So 
important are these purifying functions, proved not only by measuring the 
excreted carbonic acid, but by the fact if the skin is covered by an impermeable 
varnish, or if the body is enclosed, all but the head, in.caoutchouc dress, 
animals soon die, as if asphyxiated, the heart and lungs being gorged with 
blood, and their temperature before death gradually falling many deeeseel 
The skin is, moreover, an organ of absorption; mercurial preparations, 
when rubbed into the skin, have the same action as when given internally. 
Thus potassio-tartrate of antimony, rubbed into the skin in the form of an 
ointment or solution, may excite vomiting or an eruption extending over the 
whole body. The effect of rubbing (endermic method) is probably to force the 
particles of the matter into the orifices of the glands, where they become more 
easily absorbed than they would be through the epidermis. 
Neither alcoholic nor watery solutions of drugs are absorbed through 
the unbroken skin, unless they are dissolved in ehloretorn or other agents 
which have a notable power of endosmosis, or unless well rubbed in. 
This fact has a practical application, illustrated by the impunity with 
which arsenical dips are used, even when three or four times the ordinary 
strength, and when animals are kept in them several minutes. 
Since the functions of the animal body are resident in the various tissues 
and organs of the body, an acquaintance with the forms and structures of those 
organs and tissues must precede the study of their functions. ~ 
When these actions or functions occur in a disturbed or irregular manner 
they constitute disease or abnormal life and become the subject of abnormal 
physiology or pathology. Normal physiology is the basis of pathology, and a 
nowledge of the one must precede the intelligent study of the other; just as 
an acquaintance with the functions of the component parts of a machine must 
precede the recognition of disordered movement and the provision of means of 
repair. 
(Zo be continued. 
