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ill an uncombined state, in the urine of those, who drank 

 the mephitic water, for some days; an acid certainly 

 foreign to its recent healthy state: for, after repeated trials, 

 by heating it to nearly ebullition, in one of Priestley's 

 air-bottles, I never could procure the separation, or tran- 

 sition of a single bubble of carbonic acid, into a jar of 

 lime-water. And, if this weak acid reaches the kidneys, 

 uridecomposed or uncombined, Ave will have less difficulty 

 in believing, the more powerful ones may do so. That the 

 tartarous acid, in the combination of the acidulous tarta- 

 rite of potash, exerts powerful effects on the functions of 

 the kidneys, is well known; and, that the urine is, at the 

 same time, rendered more acid, I have repeatedly ascer- 

 tained, by the usual tests. 



We may say the same of the other vegetable acids, 

 Avhich manifest also diuretic powers, and increase the na- 

 tural acidity of the urine. Linmeus, in his second volume 

 of the Ainenitates Academicaj, De Genesi Calculi, already 

 quoted, mentions his having made the folloAving experiment 

 to this purpose. He says, " hisce diebus ipse experimetum 

 " institui -cum urina; haec communiter a solutione lacmus 

 " parum admodum rufescit; at si libram unam vel alte- 

 " ram vini Rhenani, vcl alterius vini acidi hauserim, post 

 " horani unam vel plures, valde rubra et rutilans evadit 

 " urina, ab afFusa solutione lacmus; certo indicio, acidum 

 " vini totum corpus permeasse, et urinam infecisse." Nor 

 should we wonder, that these energetic substances should 

 pass unaltered to the kidneyj, when we find so many mild 



vegetable 



