mucous eva- 



CHEMICAL PHYSIOLOGY. 59 



cury was a cholagogue and increased the excretion of 

 bile. Bile (not decomposed) has never yet been found 

 in any faeces. Most remarkable and suggestive is the A n xan in 



n . 



discovery by Liebig of alloxan in the mucous evacua- 

 tions from a case of intestinal catarrh. Alloxan is a 

 product of decomposition by oxydants of uric acid, and 

 precedes the formation of urea. Possibly, therefore, 

 functions of chemolysis are allotted to the intestine 

 which at present we place into other organs, or know 

 not where to localise. Gout might find an explanation 

 in the failure of this chemolytic action, for uric acid 

 once in the blood seems as far out of the reach of oxygen 

 as sugar in the blood is in diabetes. Imperfect diges- 

 tion further causes the production of gases, of which 

 carbonic acid constitutes the main bulk, but is mixed 

 with combustible marsh-gas, CH 4 , and some hydrothion 

 H 2 S. This development in diseases rises to painful 

 height, and in typhus, e.g., produces sometimes an 

 almost suffocating tympanites or meteorismus. 



