Chlorine in Urine. 413 



In the Middletown experiments, wide variations in these ratios are observed. 

 For example, in experiment No. 69, the first in which the ratio could be 

 obtained, it rose to 14.19 on the third day. The lowest ratio observed on any 

 day was that on the second day of experiment No. 77, 3.90. 



In experiment No. 69 there was an abnormally low phosphoric acid elimi- 

 nation, and hence the ratio is unusually high. In averaging all of the experi- 

 ments, these high ratios have been taken into consideration only on the first 

 two days. While they do not have a great influence in the averages of the first 

 two days of the fast, since they are there averaged with 11 other experiments, 

 on the third and fourth days, they would very materially raise the average 

 value of the ratio. There is, as is to be expected, a slight tendency for the 

 ratio to fall off as the fast progresses, yet the ratios are on the whole con- 

 siderably higher than those found with the other fasting experiments given in 

 table 212." The ratio apparently is constant after the third day of fast. 



While ratios as low as are commonly observed during a fast point to the 

 probable disintegration of the bones, it is only in those experiments where the 

 calcium and magnesium output has been determined that the complete data 

 for this deduction are present. Unfortunately the quantitative determination 

 of the earthy bases in the urine of the Middletown experiments have not as 

 yet been made. 



The ratios obtained by Brugsch (12) on the twenty-third to thirtieth days of 

 fasting indicate that the draft upon the phosphorus of the skeleton may in 

 prolonged fasting be very small. It is, moreover, still to be questioned whether 

 data regarding the phosphorus excretion, even when supplemented by determi- 

 nations of calcium and magnesium, will ever permit correct estimates of the 

 apportionment of the phosphorus katabolism among skeleton, nucleins, and 

 lecithins. 02 



CHLORINE. 



The elimination of chlorine in feces is normally very small, and hence dur- 

 ing inanition it can properly be said that all chlorine is eliminated through the 

 urine. The chlorine excreted during fasting may arise from the previous food, 

 the soluble chlorides of which are rapidly excreted, the excess of chlorides in 

 the fluids of the body, and the chlorine " combined " with the flesh katabolized. 93 



Since muscle contains normally but 0.04 per cent chlorine, the amounts of 

 protein usually katabolized during inanition can result in the liberation of 

 but a small amount of chlorine. 



91 Brugsch (12) found an average ratio of 5.9: 1 during the last 8 days of the 

 30-day fast made by Succi in Hamburg. This ratio is considerably higher than 

 those found on the average for the third to seventh days of the Middletown fasts. 



93 Edlefsen, Deutsches Arch. f. klin. Medizin. (1881), 29, p. 409. 



"Belli, Zeit. f. Biol. (1903), 45, p. 203. 



