DYSPEPSIA. 559 



advice of Budd and Proht, to give large doses of bicarbonate of soda 

 ( 3 ij in a pint of warm water), is worthy of attention. 



A number of renowned physicians, particularly in England and 

 France, maintain the opinion that the occurrence of oxalic acid in the 

 blood, along with some other symptoms of disease, results in a peculiar 

 form of dyspepsia, which can only be cured by removing the oxalio 

 diathesis. As the doctrine of the oxalic diathesis, and of the dys- 

 pepsia caused by it, has lately found many supporters as well as 

 many opponents in Germany also, I will briefly state my position in 

 regard to this still debatable question. 



Traces of oxalate of lime are so often found in the urine of healthy 

 persons, that it forms, as it were, a transition from the normal to the 

 abnormal constituents of urine. 



Quantities of this salt are found in the urine when the affected 

 persons' have eaten substances containing oxalates, such as certain 

 vegetables, sorrel, sheep-sorrel, or rhubarb-stalks; they also occur 

 temporarily after the free use of carbonated drinks, such as cham- 

 pagne, seltzer-water, soda-water, etc. In all of these cases no disturb- 

 ance of digestion or of the general health is observed. 



It is different in those cases where large quantities of oxalate of 

 lime occur for a length of time in the urine ; here there are almost al- 

 ways other morbid symptoms. Sometimes, along with the oxalate of 

 lime, we find spermatozoa and quantities of mucus in the urine, which 

 render it probable that, in these cases, the oxalate of lime is not ex- 

 creted by the kidneys, but forms in the urine during its stay in the 

 urinary passages. Since G-allois and Hoppe-Seyler have shown that 

 the characteristic crystals of oxalate of lime (octahedrons, so-called 

 envelope-shaped) increase in size after the urine stands awhile, we 

 cannot doubt that this salt probably also forms in secreted urine from 

 the decomposition of mucus. We must dismiss the idea that the 

 insoluble salt formed in the urinary passages can have an injurious 

 influence on the stomach and the rest of the organism; then the 

 symptoms of this form of oxaluria, disturbance of the general health, 

 melancholia, paleness, etc., will be naturally explained by the coincident 

 spermatorrhoea and the catarrh of the urinary passages. But, finally, 

 there are a greater number of cases where the oxaluria cannot be de- 

 duced from a decomposition of the secreted urine, but we are obliged to 

 refer the presence of the oxalates in the urine to an increased formation 

 of oxalic acid in the blood, that is, to an oxalic diathesis. Now, what 

 causes the proportionately rich formation of this substance in the blood 

 and its proportionate abundance in the excrements of the body, where, 

 normally, only traces of it can be found ? At present, this question 

 cannot be satisfactorily answered. However, there is no doubt that 



