been unequally corroded by the secretion. I need hardly [page 104] say
that cubes of the same cartilage, kept in water for the same length of
time, were not in the least affected.
During a more favourable season, moderately sized bits of the skinned
ear of a cat, which includes cartilage, areolar and elastic tissue,
were placed on three leaves. Some of the glands were touched with
saliva, which caused prompt inflection. Two of the leaves began to
re-expand after three days, and the third on the fifth day. The fluid
residue left on their discs was now examined, and consisted in one case
of perfectly transparent, viscid matter; in the other two cases, it
contained some elastic tissue and apparently remnants of half digested
areolar tissue.
Fibro-cartilage (from between the vertebrae of the tail of a sheep).
Moderately sized and small bits (the latter about 1/20 of an inch) were
placed on nine leaves. Some of these were well and some very little
inflected. In the latter case the bits were dragged over the discs, so
that they were well bedaubed with the secretion, and many glands thus
irritated. All the leaves re-expanded after only two days; so that they
were but little excited by this substance. The bits were not liquefied,
but were certainly in an altered condition, being swollen, much more
transparent, and so tender as to disintegrate very easily. My son
Francis prepared some artificial gastric juice, which was proved
efficient by quickly dissolving fibrin, and suspended portions of the
fibro-cartilage in it. These swelled and became hyaline, exactly like
those exposed to the secretion of Drosera, but were not dissolved. This
result surprised me much, as two physiologists were of opinion that
fibro-cartilage would be easily digested by gastric juice. I therefore
asked Dr. Klein to examine the specimens; and [page 105] he reports
that the two which had been subjected to artificial gastric juice were
in that state of digestion in which we find connective tissue when
treated with an acid, viz. swollen, more or less hyaline, the fibrillar
bundles having become homogeneous and lost their fibrillar structure.
In the specimens which had been left on the leaves of Drosera, until
they re-expanded, parts were altered, though only slightly so, in the
same manner as those subjected to the gastric juice as they had become
more transparent, almost hyaline, with the fibrillation of the bundles
indistinct. Fibro-cartilage is therefore acted on in nearly the same
manner by gastric juice and by the secretion of Drosera.
92