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innate morbid proclivity, which can only be represented by 

 the term diathesis. Contrasted with malaria, the causes of 

 this diathesis work much more slowly, as a much longer 

 residence in the locality is essential for the production of 

 their effects ; and, for their full development, it appears 

 necessary that hereditary transmission should have existed 

 through several generations. 



Mr. Jonathan Hutchinson insists upon the features of 

 distinction between diatheses due to food, and those to be 

 assigned to climate, and says : " The latter are distinctly 

 restricted and endemic ; the others not so. The latter, 

 when severe, affect all immigrants who come within their 

 range of influence, without regard to health, position, or 

 habits, and under certain circumstances leave scarcely any 

 exempt. The diet-diatheses, on the contrary, as illustrated 

 by leprosy and the like, affect immigrants only very seldom, 

 -and with great apparent capriciousness, taking one, and 

 leaving a thousand untouched." I shall now proceed to 

 briefly discuss these diet-diatheses, which constitute a group 

 of great importance, and may be regarded as " persistent 

 constitutional conditions, sometimes hereditary, at others 

 not so, which have their origin in connection with food." 

 There can be no doubt that personal habits as to the use 

 and abuse of certain articles of diet are so capable of 

 modifying the health of individuals, as to produce in them 

 such constitutional conditions as will predispose them to 

 certain diseases, and that this predisposition may become 

 hereditary. We are therefore justified in including these 

 morbid proclivities in the category of the diatheses. 



The Gouty Diathesis is the first and most important to 

 be discussed in this class, and it is capable of assuming 

 widely different forms, and of causing a vast number of 



