XLIII. Experiments on animals and vegetables, with respect to the power of producing heat

Abstract

The ingenious experiments and observations lately presented to this learned Society, upon a power which animals seem to possess of generating cold, induced me to look over my notes of certain experiments and observations made in the year 1766, which indicate an opposite power in animals; whereby they are capable of resisting any external cold while alive, by generating within themselves a degree of heat sufficient to counteract it. These experiments were not originally instituted in view of the discovery, which in the event resulted from them, but for a very different purpose; which was no other than to satisfy myself, whether an animal could retain life after it was frozen, as had been confidently asserted both of fish and snakes. I mention this, to account for what might otherwise be attributed to negligence and inattention; namely, that little nicety was used in measuring the precise degrees of the cold applied in these experiments. Accuracy in this particular was not aimed at, being of no consequence in the inquiry more immediately before me.