[231] Op. cit.
In one rabbit, although the corpuscles sank to 1,416,000, yet recovery took place.
Dr. MacMunn[232] has examined specimens of blood from two of Mr. Snell’s patients; he found a distinct departure from the normal; the red corpuscles were smaller than usual, about 5 or 6 µ in diameter, and the appearances were like those seen in pernicious anæmia. Huber, in some of his experiments on animals, found a spectroscopic change in the blood, viz., certain absorption bands, one in the red between C and D, and two in the green between D and E; the action of reducing agents on this dinitro-benzol blood, as viewed in a spectroscope provided with a scale in which C = 48, D = 62, and E = 80·5, was as follows:—
[232] Op. cit.
| Dinitro-Bands. | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| In Red. | In Green. | ||
| 50-52 | 62-66 | 70-77 | |
| After NH4SO4, | 53-55 | 62-66 | 70-77 |
| Af„er NH3, | 54-58 | 60-65 | 70-77 |
| Af„er NH4SO4 + NH3, | 52-55 | 60-65 | 70-77 |
Taking the symptoms as a whole, there has been noted:—a blue colour of the lips, not unfrequently extending over the whole face, and even the conjunctivæ have been of a marked blue colour, giving the sufferer a strange livid appearance. In other cases there have been jaundice, the conjunctivæ and the skin generally being yellow, the lips blue. Occasionally gastric symptoms are present. Sleeplessness is common, and not unfrequently there is some want of muscular co-ordination, and the man staggers as if drunk. In more than one case there has been noticed sudden delirium. There is in chronic cases always more or less anæmia, and the urine is remarkable in its colour, which ranges from a slightly dark hue up to positive blackness. In a large proportion of cases there is ophthalmic trouble, the characteristics of which (according to Mr. Snell) are “failure of sight, often to a considerable degree, in a more or less equal extent on the two sides; concentric attraction of visual field with, in many cases, a central colour scotoma; enlargement of retinal vessels, especially the veins; some blurring, never extensive, of edges of disc, and a varying degree of pallor of its surface—the condition of retinal vessels spoken of being observed in workers with the dinitro-benzol, independently of complaints of defective sight. Cessation of work leads to recovery.”
§ 250. Detection of Dinitro-benzol.—Dinitro-benzol may be detected in urine, in blood, and in fluids generally, by the following process:—Place tinfoil in the fluid, and add hydrochloric acid to strong acidity, after allowing the hydrogen to be developed for at least an hour, make the fluid alkaline by caustic soda, and extract with ether in a separating tube; any metaphenylene-diamine will be contained in the ether; remove the ether into a flask, and distil it off; dissolve the residue in a little water.