FORCE EVOLVED BY ALBUMINATES. 151 



-organism is more vigorous and fit for work the more oxygen is 

 thus stored up. 



It was also observed by Valentin, thaj; hybernating animals 

 at times gain weight between the weighings, owing to absorp- 

 tion 'of oxygen, although a certain constant loss by carbonic 

 acid and water is going on. Also in diabetes and leucoemia, in 

 which the debility is so well known, Pettenkofer and Yoit 

 found that the nocturnal absorption of oxygen does not take 

 place. Thus is accounted for the fact that labourers are unable 

 to do the same amount of work on a diet with too little flesh- 

 meat, although furnished with an ample supply of the fatty and 

 starchy matters to extricate the requisite amount of force. In 

 this case, as in disease and in otherwise unwholesome feeding, 

 the requisite nocturnal storing up of oxygen does not take place 

 to render the individual fresh and vigorous in the morning. 



Pettenkofer and Voit showed that this store was formed only 

 through the means of albumin-substances, and the maximum 

 of the storing was regulated by the amount of these. So even 

 if the ultimate oxidation of fats and sugars did furnish force for 

 work, still the albuminates by this storing of oxygen always 

 took an essential part in the process, and therefore " in this case 

 also the quantity of the albuminous matter determines the 

 amount of work"* (p. 14). Again, after disproving Liebig's 

 2nd and 3rd propositions, viz., that muscular work is the sole 

 cause of decomposition of albumen, and urea the measure of 

 work, and that it is the formed muscular structure which is 

 consumed, Pettenkofer and Voit still uphold the 1st proposi- 

 tion, viz., that the work of the muscle is furnished by the decom- 

 position of albuminous matter alone. This, in spite of the 

 difficulty that the urea is not increased by muscular work ; and 

 Voit controverts by experiment and reasoning all the efforts 

 to explain this away, even those of Liebig who suggests that 

 the products are not excreted in the same day, and appeals to 

 the experiments of Parkes, who, however, drew no such con- 

 clusion from them, but, on the contrary, confirms the fact that 

 there is no increase of urea, though he gives no help in the ex- 



* " Lehre von der Quelle der Muskelkraft," &c., von Carl Voit, 

 1870. 



