Having grasped the above facts, let us now proceed to apply them to the problem before us. When an animal is killed in any manner whatever, it does not instantly die. It loses consciousness, its heart ceases to beat, its conscious and somatic life end, but its _tissues_ still continue to live—for several hours, in the case of warm-blooded animals, for several days in the case of cold-blooded animals, like the snake and the turtle. During the time which elapses between death, so-called, and the actual death of the cells and tissues of the body, the activity of the animal tissues consumes the soluble food material which is in contact with these cells and tissues—at the same time continuing to produce those waste substances, which, during life, are rapidly removed from the body through the kidneys, lungs, and other excretory organs. It is by the accumulation of these poisons after death that the tissues are killed. During life, the tissues are washed by a pure stream of blood, which not only bathes but feeds them, and at the same time gathers up the waste substances and carries them to the liver for distribution to the kidneys, lungs and skin, for elimination. “When the heart ceases to beat, this cleansing process ceases, and the poisons which are ever forming, accumulate at a rapid rate until the vital fluids are so saturated that every living structure is killed. The arteries continue to contract after death until all the blood which they contain is forced on into the tissues, and still farther on into the veins, so that the flesh of a dead animal contains nothing but venous blood and poisonous juices, in addition to the organised tissues which have not yet been broken down.