148 THE PROTEIN ELEMENT IN NUTRITION 



meet the demands for energy in the performance of the mildest 

 forms of muscular activity, and, therefore, would be much less 

 able to permit of the carrying out of the varied duties detailed 

 for these soldiers. 



Examination of the records for the professional and athletic 

 groups would indicate that in these cases also the energy fur- 

 nished by the dietaries, if correct, was insufficient to meet the 

 different conditions that obtained. 



The only conclusion to be drawn from these facts is that, 

 unless all the world is wrong again, as Chittenden believes it to 

 be with regard to the nitrogenous requirements of the body, in 

 holding that the law of the conservation of energy obtains in 

 the human organism, and that we must therefore fall back on 

 the discarded theory of vitalism, there must be some unexplained 

 source of fallacy in the figures given for the potential energy of 

 the dietaries on which the three groups existed. 



We believe this fallacy can be explained on the assumption 

 that the factors made use of in calculating the energy of the 

 foodstuffs were too low, and that the diets during the periods 

 of nitrogen balance do not accurately represent the total food 

 consumption in the long intervening periods. As already stated, 

 we had arrived at a somewhat similar conclusion with regard 

 to the level of nitrogenous metabolism exhibited by the subjects 

 of the experiment. 



Since this was written Loeser, in a paper* dealing with the 

 good effects of an increased standard of protein metabolism on 

 the stamina and general efficiency of miners in the Transvaal, 

 states that inquiries, made from the soldiers of Chittenden's 

 second group, elicited the important information that the men 

 admit to have had " square meals on the quiet " during the 

 whole period of the experiment. If this was really the case, it 

 would explain much that is otherwise inexplicable in Chittenden's 

 results, as discussed above, and would lessen considerably the 

 value of his conclusions as regards the protein needs of the body. 



Against the conclusions arrived at by Chittenden, we have 

 cited a considerable number of facts and observations based on 

 the known effects and results that follow existence on dietaries 

 low in protein. We shall now turn to the evidence afforded 

 by the inhabitants of large tracts of India, and consider what 

 light the conditions that obtain throw on the merits or demerits 

 of dietaries poor in protein. 



" : Transvaal Med. Journ., 1912. 



