777. 1. It is proved that galvanic phenomena may be excited by the contact of the nerve and muscle in an animal recently dead. A galvanic pile may be constructed of alternate layers of nervous and muscular substance, or of nervous substance and other animal tissues. A secreting organ liberally supplied with organic nerve is probably then in its physical structure nothing but a galvanic apparatus. It is certain that some animals, as the raia torpedo, possess a special electrical apparatus composed essentially of nervous matter; that the nerves which compose this apparatus correspond strictly with the organic nerves of the human body; that they are distributed principally to the organs of digestion and secretion, and that they exert a powerful influence over these processes; for, when the animal is frequently excited to give shocks, digestion appears to be completely arrested; so that, after the animal’s death, food swallowed some time previously is found wholly unchanged. 778. 2. It is universally admitted that the nerves in all animals possess an extreme sensibility to the stimulus of electricity, and more especially to that form of it which is termed galvanism. 779. 3. Direct experiment proves that the stimulus of galvanism may be made to produce in the living-body precisely the same effect as the nervous influence. It has been stated, that the division of the par vagum, in the neck of a living animal, suspends the digestion of the food probably by stopping indirectly the secretion of the gastric juice. If after the division of the nerves, their lower ends, that is, that portion of the nerves which is still in communication with the stomach, but no longer in communication with the brain, be made to conduct galvanic fluid to the stomach, secretion goes on as fast as when the nerves are entire and conduct nervous influence. Dr. Wilson Philip having divided the par vagum in the neck of a living animal, coated a portion of the lower end of the nerves with tin foil, placed a silver plate over the stomach of the animal, and connected respectively the tin and silver with the opposite extremities of a galvanic apparatus. The result was that the animal remained entirely free from the distressing symptoms which had always before attended the division of the nerves, and that the process of digestion, which had been invariably suspended by this operation, now went on just as in the natural state of the stomach. On examining the stomach after death, the food was found perfectly digested, and afforded a striking contrast to the state of the food contained in the stomach of a similar animal, in whom the nerves had been divided, but which had not been subjected to the galvanic influence.