Experiments and observations to prove that the beneficial effects of many medicines are produced through the medium of the circulating blood, more particularly that of the colchicum autumnale upon the gout. By Sir Everard Home, Bart. V. P. R. S. Communicated by the Society for improving animal chemistry

TheEau medicinale of Husson, says the author, has most fortunately been discovered to be a specific remedy for the cure of gout; and he considers it to be now ascertained, by experiments of different persons, that this medicine is a vinous infusion of theColchicum autumnale , or Meadow Saffron. He therefore hoped that an endeavour to ascertain its mode of action would be interesting to the Society for the Promotion of Animal Chemistry, whose objects are not confined to mere chemical combinations, but include the effects of galvanism on the nerves, and of mineral and vegetable solutions on the blood, and thereby on the healthy and morbid actions of life. Although the late Mr. Hunter had ascertained, by experiments, that medicines injected directly into the circulating system produce in general the same effects as when taken into the stomach, he was not aware that even in the latter case (as has been proved by later experiments) these effects are not produced till they have reached the circulation by means of the absorbent system.