of a dog. Immediately the whole legs were spasmodically extended; at times convulsions occurred; and in ten minutes it died. The chest being laid open instantly, coagulated florid blood was seen in the left ventricle, and black fluid blood in the right ventricle of the heart. No unusual appearance was discernible any where else except complete exhaustion of muscular irritability.[1] The experiments of Mr. Blake also show that ammonia introduced in large doses into the veins acts by suddenly extinguishing the irritability of the heart. Small doses first lower arterial pressure from debility of the heart's action, and then increase it by obstructing the systemic capillaries. When injected into the aorta from the axillary artery, it causes great increase of arterial pressure, owing to the latter cause; and then arrests the heart, while the respiration goes on. Four seconds are sufficient for the ammonia to pass from the jugular vein into the heart, so as to be discovered there by muriatic acid causing white fumes.[2] Half a drachm of a strong solution, introduced by Orfila into the stomach of a dog and secured by a ligature on the gullet, caused at first much agitation. But in five minutes the animal became still and soporose; after five hours it continued able to walk; in twenty hours it was found quite comatose; and death ensued in four hours more. The only morbid appearance was slight mottled redness of the villous coat of the stomach. A third dog, to which two drachms and a half of the common carbonate were given in fine powder, died in twelve minutes. First it vomited; next it became slightly convulsed; and the convulsions gradually increased in strength and frequency till the whole body was agitated by dreadful spasms; then the limbs became rigid, the body and head were bent backwards, and in this state it expired, apparently suffocated in a fit of tetanus.[3]
Several cases of poisoning with ammonia or its carbonate have occurred in the human subject. Plenck has noticed shortly a case which proved fatal in four minutes, and which was caused by a little bottleful of ammonia having been poured into the mouth of a man who had been bitten by a mad-dog.[4] The symptoms are not mentioned, but it is probable, from the rapidity of the poisoning, that a nervous affection must have been induced. More generally, however, the effects are simply irritant; and the seat of the irritation will vary with the mode in which the poison is given. If it is swallowed, the stomach and intestines will suffer; if it is imprudently inhaled in too great quantity, inflammation of the lining membrane of the nostrils and air-passages will ensue. Huxham has related a very interesting example of the former affection, as it occurred in a young man, who had acquired a strange habit of chewing the solid carbonate of the shops. He was seized with great hemorrhage from the nose, gums, and intestines; his teeth dropt out; wasting and hectic fever ensued; and, although he was at length prevailed on to abandon his pernicious habit, he died of extreme exhaustion, after lin-*
