IV. On the effects produced in human blood-corpuscles by sherry wine, &c

Abstract

The author has found that when a small drop of fresh blood is placed beside a similar drop of sherry wine on a slip of glass, and viewed with the microscope, after being covered as usual with a thin piece of glass, certain changes are seen to take place in the blood as it mingles with the wine, which are thus described :— “In those parts where the wine is mingling with the blood—at the outer edges of the mass—various altered corpuscles will be seen. They float in the fluid, separated from each other, having now no longer any disposition to adhere together in rolls. Their outlines are altered, and sundry markings appear in their interior. After a short time—perhaps ten minutes, sometimes sooner—numerous cor­puscles will be observed throwing out matter from their interior; two, five, or ten molecular spots fringing their circumference. Some of these molecules grow larger and seem coloured; others of them elongate into tails or filaments, which frequently attain to an extra­ordinary length, and wave about in a very remarkable manner. They all terminate, at the extremity farthest from the corpuscle, in a round globular enlargement. A single corpuscle may very frequently be seen with five or six of these tails.