CHLORIDES. 719 



leucomaine, but is probably derived from smoking tooacco or from drinking coffee. 

 The imidazole derivatives histidine and imidazolamino-acetic acid found by KUT- 

 SCHER and ENGELAND l also belong to this group. 



Under pathological conditions the quantity of lucomaines and other bodies 

 may be increased (BOUCHARD, LEPINE and GUERIN, VILLIERS, GRIFFITHS, ALBU, 

 and others). Within the last few years the poisonous properties of urine have 

 been the subject of more thorough investigation, especially by BOUCHARD. He 

 found that the night urine is less poisonous than the day urine, and that the 

 poisonous constituents of the day and night urine have not the same action. 

 In order to be able to compare the toxic power of the urine under different con- 

 ditions, BOUCHARD determines the UROTOXIC COEFFICIENT, which is the weight 

 of rabbit in kilos that is killed by the quantity of urine excreted in twenty-four 

 hours by 1 kilo of the person experimented upon. 2 



BAUMANN and v. UDRANSZKY have shown that ptomaines may occur in the 

 urine under pathological conditions. They demonstrated the presence of the 

 two ptomaines discovered and first isolated by BRIEGER putrescine, C 4 H 12 N 2 

 (tetramethylenediamine), and cadaverine, C 5 H 14 N 2 (pentamethylenediamine) in 

 the urine of a patient suffering from cystinuria and catarrh of the bladder. Cadav- 

 erine has later been found by STADTHAGEN and BRIEGER in the urine in two cases 

 of cystinuria. BRIEGER, v. UDRANSZKY and BAUMANN, and STADTHAGEN have 

 shown that neither these nor other diamines occur under physiological condi- 

 tions, while DoMBROWSKi, 3 on the contrary, found cadaverine in normal urine. 



Many substances have been observed in animal urine which are not found in 

 human urine. To these belong the above-described kynurenic acid, urocanic acid, 

 also found in dog's urine and which seems to stand in some relation to the 

 purine bases ; damaluric acid and damolic acid (according to SCHOTTEN, 4 probably 

 a mixture of benzoic acid with volatile fatty acids), obtained by the distillation 

 of cow's urine ; and lastly lithuric acid, found in the urinary concrements of certain 

 animals. 



III. INORGANIC CONSTITUENTS OF URINE. 



Chlorides. The chlorine occurring in the urine is undoubtedly com- 

 bined with the bases contained in this excretion; the chief part is in com- 

 bination with sodium. In accordance with this, the quantity of chlorine 

 in the urine is generally expressed as NaCl. 



The question as to whether a part of the chlorine contained in the urine 

 exists as organic combinations, as considered by BERLIOZ and LEPINOIS, 

 is still disputed, although recently BAUMGARTEN 5 has supported this view. 



The quantity of chlorine combinations in the urine is subject to con- 

 siderable variation. In general the amount from a healthy adult on a 



1 de Filippi, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 49; Bauer, Hofmeister's Beitrage, 11; 

 Kutscher, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 51, with Lohmann, ibid., 48 and 49; Achelis, 

 ibid., 50; Engeland, ibid., 57, and Munch, med. Wochenschr., 55. 



2 See footnote 7, page 718. 



3 Baumann and Udranszky, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 13; Stadthagen and Brieger, 

 Virchow's Arch., 115; Dombrowski, Arch, polonais. d. sciences biol., 1903. 



4 Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 7. 



5 Berlioz and Lepinois, see Chem. Centralbl., 1894, 1, and 1895, 1; also Petit and 

 Terrat, ibid., 1894, 2, and Vitali, ibid., 1897, 2; Ville and Moitessier, Maly's Jahres- 

 ber., 31; Meillere, ibid.; Bruno, ibid., 452; Baumgarten, Zeitschr. f. exp. Path. u. 

 Therap., 5. 



