Page:Philosophical Transactions - Volume 005.djvu/161

 the Air is withdrawn by the Engin, yet at the and of two full minutes, letting in the Air, and then taking off the Receiver we found the Bird irrecoverable; notwithstanding which we did not find any no. table alteration in the Lungs and found the Heart (or at least the Auricles of it) to be yet beating, and so it continued for a while after.

The same day.

We took also a pretty large Frog, and having without violating the Lungs or the Guts made two such incisions in the Abdomen, that the two curled bladders or lobes of the Lungs came out almost totally at them, we suspended the Frog by the legs in a small Receiver, and after we had pumped out a good part of the Air, the Animal strugled very much; and seemed to be much disordered, and when the Receiver was well exhausted she lay still for a while as if she had been dead, the Abdomen and thigh very much swelled, as if some ratified Air or Vapor forcibly distended them. But as, when the Frog was put in, one of the Lobes was almost full, and the other almost shrunk up, so they continued to appear, after the Receiver had been exhausted; but upon letting in of the Air, not only the body ceased to be tumid, but the plump bladder appeared for a while shrunk up as the other, and the Receiver being removed, the Frog presently revived, and quickly began to fill the Lobe again with Air.

Ithout discussing the opinions of Learned men about the connexion and dependency of the Motion of the Bloud, and Beating Heart, I thought, it might give me a sufficient inducement to make the following Experiment, that several sorts of Animals would be presently killed in our Vacuum by the withdrawing of the Air, and even the Insects mentioned in the formerly published Digression about Respiration, though they also were not totally deprived of life by the absence of the Air, yet they were of visible motion: Wherefore some good hint or other being to be hoped for from the discovering, whether or no a separated Heart, which is but a part of an Animal, would continue its motions in our Vacuum; we made some tryals to that purpose, whose success I find thus set down.

The Heart of an Eele being taken out and laid upon a plate of Tin in a small Receiver, when se perceived it to beat there as it had done in