THE SCIENCE AND ART OF PROTEAL THERAPY 209 



man with the appearance of robust health. His skin has a good 

 healthy glow, his actions are vigorous and energetic; and he 

 reports himself as feeling exceedingly well. His appetite is so 

 good that he has to curb it to prevent overeating ; he sleeps well 

 (although obliged to get up several times to empty the bladder, 

 the urine, however, showing no abnormality on analysis) ; and 

 he is able to perform fairly vigorous labor, such as wood-sawing, 

 shoveling snow, and the like, and in general to execute the duties 

 incident to keeping his modest country establishment in order, 

 without experiencing shortness of breath or undue fatigue. His 

 pulse, during his visits at my office, has ranged from 72 to 80; 

 and the blood pressure from 145 to 130, a fairly characteristic 

 reduction under Proteal treatment. In a word, the clinical symp- 

 tom-complex is that of a man substantially normal, well pre- 

 served, and more than moderately active and robust for his age. 



All this, it will be observed, with a total corpuscular count of 

 about three and a third millions, of which leucocytes comprised 

 more than a million; leaving (according to the most recent 

 count) only 2,324,000 erythrocytes ; and providing a haemoglobin 

 index of 70. 



Incidentally, I may suggest that the fact that this patient 

 appears not to suffer in the least from lack of oxygenation of the 

 tissues gives strong support to the Proteomorphic thesis that the 

 full normal equipment of red corpuscles is by no means necessary 

 for the carrying of oxygen ; for of course it is not to be supposed 

 that the leucocytes can compensate the red corpuscles in this 

 regard ; moreover, even if they were able to do so (no such sug- 

 gestion is made), the total number of corpuscles is still not much 

 above three-fifths of the normal. However, cases of other 

 types are common enough in which an erythrocytic equipment of 

 3,000,000 or even 2,000,000, suffices to oxygenate the tissues. 



The anomaly is, that the universal processes of food hydrolysis 

 and of bodily metabolism in general in this case have been carried 

 out for a term of years with a corpuscular equipment so strangely 

 maladjusted. 



But the mystery is to some extent clarified if we accept the 

 general thesis of the Proteomorphic theory and the special inter- 

 pretation of that thesis just elaborated, according to which the 

 functions of the different types of leucocytes overlap or are 

 complementary, permitting what might be described as team 

 work, through which weakness in one leucocytic department may 

 be effectively compensated in another ; and that similar team work 

 is possible between the white corpuscles and the red, as regards 

 the proteolytic functions of the latter. 



These theoretical assumptions, considered in the light of such a 

 case of lymphatic leukaemia as that just recorded, give us at least 



