



172 FIBRINE, ALBUMEN, GLUTEN, ETC. 



Albumen is very nutritious, and is of easy digestion ; but its diges- 

 tibility is impaired by being boiled hard, and by frying. Liquid al- 

 bumen is coagulated by the gastric juice, and afterwards dissolved. 

 It is said to be the origin of all the animal tissue, and all nitrogenized 

 food, derived either from animals or vegetables ; and its principles 

 are converted into albumen before they form a part in nutrition. But 

 animals cannot subsist alone on albumen ; they refuse to take it, in- 

 deed, after a few days, and prefer to suffer hunger and death. Caseine, 

 constituting chiefly a part of animal substances, milk and cheese espe- 

 cially, does not claim so much attention here. 



Fibrine, in the gluten of wheat flour, and rye meal, is composed, in 

 100 parts, of the first named Carbon 54, hydrogen 7.200, nitrogen 

 15.500, oxygen, sulphur, phosphorus 23, and in that of rye meal 

 of nearly the very same elements. The proximate or proteinaceous 

 principles of vegetables, Liebig says, are identical with the fibrine, al- 

 bumen and caseine of animals, and also the gluten. 



Vegetable fibrins is most abundant in the cereal grasses, in many 

 rich fruits and fresh vegetable juices, as beet roots, carrots, turnips, 

 &c. ; and it is seen to coagulate from these by standing. 



The albumen of rye is composed of carbon 54.74, hydrogen 7.77, ni- 

 trogen 15.85, oxygen, &c. 21.64. These principles are equally as 

 nutritive in vegetables as in animals. In the latter they form blood. 

 These important elements are indeed chiefly obtained by animals from 

 the vegetable kingdom. 



Vegetable albumen abounds in the cerelia. It is likewise found 

 abundantly in oily seeds, as with the nuts, &c. A considerable quan- 

 tity is contained in vegetable juices, as in those of the cabbages, car- 

 rots, cauliflowers, asparagus, turnips, and most cultivated nutritive 

 vegetables. It is separated from its coagulum of fibrine. Vegetable 

 caseine, or legumine, is obtained chiefly from leguminous seeds, as 

 peas, beans, &.c. ; also from oily seeds, or nuts, and vegetable juices. 



Gluten remains after the starch, gum, sugar, and albumen are 

 washed from wheaten dough under a stream of water. When boiled 

 in alcohol it is formed into 2 parts; one is held in solution, and the 

 other is insoluble in it. This last, according to Leibig, is vegetable 

 fibrine, and the first is gluten, which is supposed to consist of mucine 

 and glutine. The composition of gluten, in 100 parts, is glutine 20, 

 vegetable fibrine or albumen 72, mucine 4, oily matter 3, with traces of 

 starch. The proportions of this in wheat vary according to soil and 

 culture, from 9 to 35 in 100 parts. Manured with human urine, it 

 yields 35, and the foeces 33.94, ox blood 34, horse manure 13, cow do. 

 11.96, pigeon do. 12, vegetable humus 9.6, and without manure 9.2. 

 Rice yields 3.60, maize 3, beans 5.758, dry peas 10, potatoes, 3.5 red 

 beet 1.3. 



Gluten is of easy digestion by the acid of the gastric juice ; it is 



