URIC ACID. 213 



merely show it is impossible to lay down numerically any general 

 standard of comparison. 



Generally, I have only examined the morning urine, in which 

 I have even found as much as 0'878-g- of uric acid ; investigations 

 regarding the relative qualities of the excreted urinary constituents, 

 can only lead to any useful results when they are instituted on one 

 and the same person, and on the whole urine passed in 24 hours 

 for several days in succession. I have endeavoured to arrive at 

 results, in accordance with the above principles, respecting the 

 amount of urine discharged under different conditions, but I have 

 failed in discovering anything further than that in winter more 

 water is certainly discharged through the urinary bladder, but that 

 in summer, during continuous perspirations, the solid constituents, 

 and especially the uric acid, are neither more nor less than in 

 winter. It is unnecessary to give the numerical results from which 

 these conclusions were drawn. 



There are however other conditions which give rise both to an 

 absolute and a relative augmentation of the uric acid on the urine, 

 and in the first place amongst them we must notice disturbed or 

 imperfect digestion. 



Thus, I have observed both in myself and in several other 

 persons, that if indigestible food or spirituous liquors not suffi- 

 ciently spiced be taken shortly before bed-time, the morning urine 

 always deposited a considerable sediment. While in the normal 

 state the ratio of the uric acid to the urea=l : 28 to 30, I found 

 that in urine passed after indigestion, the ratio=l : 23 to 26, and 

 that the ratio of the uric acid to the other solid constituents, 

 which is ordinarily about = 1 : 60 was now= 1 : 41 to 52, so that the 

 amount of uric acid is here not only increased at the expense of 

 the urea, but also at that of the other solid constituents of the 

 urine. In the most marked case, I found in 100 parts of solid 

 residue 2'4 of uric acid, 35*2 of urea, and 62.4 of other solid con- 

 stituents: hence the latter were absolutely increased in this 

 urine. 



Consequently it is easy to understand why there is an augmen- 

 tation of the uric a,cid in the urine, in many of those cases which 

 the older physicians regarded as stases of the portal circulation, 

 haemorrhoids, and arthritis. 



An augmentation in the amount of uric acid in the urine 

 always accompanies the group of symptoms which we are in the 

 habit of designating as fever, the uric acid either separating or 

 remaining dissolved ; for no conclusions can be drawn regarding 



