ALCOHOL 



185 



tion of certain of the digestive fluids, and meets a positive nutritive demand on the part 

 of the system. Numerous experiments and observations have shown that a deficiency 

 of chloride of sodium in the food has an unfavorable influence on nutrition. 



Phosphate of Lime. This is almost as common a constituent of vegetable and animal 

 food as chloride of sodium. It is seldom taken except in combination, particularly with 

 the nitrogenized alimentary principles. Its importance as an alimentary principle has 

 been experimentally demonstrated, it having been shown that, in animals deprived as 

 completely as possible of this substance, the nutrition of the body, particularly in parts 

 which contain it in considerable quantity, as the bones, is seriously affected. 



Iron. Hasmaglobine, the coloring matter of the blood, contains, intimately united 

 with organic matter, a considerable proportion of iron. Examples of anemia, which 

 are daily met with in practice and are almost always relieved in a short time by the ad- 

 ministration of iron, are proof of the importance of this substance as an alimentary 

 principle. The quantity of iron which is discharged from the body is very slight, a 

 trace only being discoverable in the urine. A small quantity of iron is frequently intro- 

 duced in solution in the water taken as drink, and it is a constant constituent of milk 

 and eggs. When its supply in the food is insufficient, it is necessary, in order to restore 

 the processes of nutrition to their normal condition, to administer it in some form, until 

 its proportion in the organism reaches the proper standard. 



It is hardly necessary even to enumerate the other inorganic alimentary principles, as 

 nearly all are in a state of such intimate combination with nitrogenized principles that 

 they may be regarded as part of their substance. Suffice it to say, that all the inorganic 

 matters which exist in the organism as proximate principles are found in the food. That 

 these are essential to nutrition, cannot be doubted ; but it is evident that, by themselves, 

 they are incapable of supporting life, as they cannot be converted into either nitrogen- 

 ized or non-nitrogenized organic principles. 



Alcohol. 



All distilled and fermented liquors and wines contain a greater or less proportion of 

 alcohol. As these are so generally used as beverages, and as the effects of their exces- 

 sive use are so serious, the influence of alcohol upon the organism has become one of the 

 most important questions connected with alimentation. In the discussion of this subject, 

 it is not proposed to enter into the great moral questions involved, but to consider, from 

 a purely physiological point of view, the immediate and remote influences of the various 

 alcoholic beverages upon nutrition and the animal functions. Some alcoholic beverages 

 influence the functions solely through the alcohol which they contain ; while others, as 

 beer and porter, with a comparatively small proportion of alcohol, .contain a consider- 

 able quantity of solid matters which may act as alimentary principles. 



Alcohol (04H 8 O 2 ), from its composition, is to be classed with the non-nitrogenized 

 principles, more especially the fats, in which the hydrogen and oxygen do not exist in 

 the proportion to form water. We have seen that sugar and fat are essential to proper 

 nutrition and that they undergo important changes in the organism. Alcohol is capable 

 of being absorbed and taken into the blood ; and it becomes a question of great interest 

 to determine whether it be consumed in the economy or whether it be discharged un- 

 changed by the various emunctories. 



Alcohol has long since been recognized in the expired air after it has been taken into 

 the stomach ; and late researches have confirmed the earlier observations with regard to 

 its elimination in its original form and have shown that, after it has been taken in quan- 

 tity, it exists in the blood and all the tissues and organs, particularly the liver and ner- 



