TOTAL METABOLISM IN INANITION 501 



muscles are affected in a higher degree than the heart ; Voit 

 calculated in case of the cat that while the muscles had lost 

 thirty per cent, in weight, the heart had been reduced only 

 three per cent. However, the statements recorded in refer- 

 ence to this point in literature are contradictory. 



As far as the blood is concerned, the most constant change 

 seems to be a relative increase of its globulins as contrasted 

 with the albumins (as observed by Burckhardt, Githens, 

 Waller stein and others). This is accounted for in different 

 ways, in the first place as due to a passing of the globulins 

 out of the tissues, and in the second place on the ground that 

 albumin principally is derived from the food; however, the 

 connection is not clear. Sometimes, too, it is said that there 

 is a "thickening," or, on the other hand, that there is an 

 "atrophy " of the blood (where it is held there is a loss of its 

 formed elements proportionate to the body mass). The in- 

 creased amount of fat in the blood in inanition is striking 

 (vide infra). Some have regarded observations of Landois 

 upon artificial plethora by injection of blood, in which condi- 

 tion the excess of serum proteins as circulating protein is 

 easily used, but the "tissue protein " of the red blood cells 

 is much more slowly broken down, as of importance to our 

 conception of the condition of the blood in inanition ; how- 

 ever, there has not been any important conclusion from it. 

 Benedict has noted in fasting human beings a progressive 

 loss of leucocytes, erythrocytes and haemoglobin. 



Total Metabolism in Inanition. What then of the gen- 

 eral exchange in fasting? 45 It might be expected in the first 

 place that the fasting individual would lower his require- 

 ment. This, however, is not the case ; in spite of expendi- 

 ture of the body substance proper, the organism is unable to 

 materially lower its exchange below that of normal nutrition. 

 It is true the energy consumption is lowered from day to -day, 

 but at the same time the body weight also is diminished. If 



40 Cf. Literature upon Energy Exchange in Inanition: R. Tigerstedt, 

 Handb. d. Biochem., 4" 55-66, 1910. 



