Having then shewn under what circumstances the phenomenon in question may take place, we shall now proceed to describe more minutely the appearances which it may assume, and _first, with respect to the part of the stomach, more usually acted upon by the gastric solvent_. _Mr. Hunter_ thought, that digestion of the stomach after death was occasioned by that portion of the gastric juice _contained in the cavity_ of the stomach; consequently it followed, as a fair inference from this doctrine, that the coats of this viscus will only be acted on at that part on which the contents of the stomach rested. In _Mr. Hunter’s_ cases, the great end of the stomach, which in the supine position of the body is the most depending part of this viscus, was found to be chiefly affected; a fact which tended to corroborate and support his opinion, and to render his conjecture extremely probable. Other anatomists, however, have discovered instances of solution of other parts of the stomach than the great end, indeed we have already described such an instance in the case of the emaciated and anasarcous girl examined by _Mr. Burns_, where the situation of the aperture was different from what it had been in any of _Mr. Hunter’s_ cases. It was seated _on the fore-part_ of the stomach, about an inch distant from the pylorus, and mid-way between the smaller and greater curvatures of this viscus; at a part of the stomach with which the gastric juice _could not have come into contact_, as the body had constantly been in the supine posture. “If then,” asks _Mr. Burns_, “the stomach was not acted on by the fluid contained in its cavity, how came it to be dissolved?” To us we confess his solution of the problem appears sensible and satisfactory. “We cannot, with propriety, ascribe the digestion of the stomach, in every case, to the gastric juice which has been _poured into the cavity_ of that viscus; we are more properly in some instances to refer it to the action of the fluid _retained in the vessels_ which had secreted it.” If this be admitted as a correct explanation of the fact, we shall cease to have any difficulty in accounting for the dissolution of other parts of this viscus besides the large end. We shall learn that the part acted on must vary, according to the place of the stomach where the gastric juice is retained in the apparatus which secreted it, and thus we shall be enabled to explain some cases, which, at present, seem to be in opposition to the observation of _Mr. Hunter_.