NINTH ANNUAL MEETING. 49 
As the schedule indicates, we have albuminoids in plants, as 
in the gluten of wheat ; and in the animal body, as in the fibrin- 
ogen and fibrinoplastic substances of blood, in the fibrin of 
muscle, in egghalbumen (white of eggs), and in the casein (curd) 
of milk. 
The albuminoids are the most important of the nutrients of 
foods. Not enly do they share in the formation of the fatty 
tissues and in the supply of material for the production of 
animal heat and muscular power, thus performing all of the 
functions of the other food ingredients in the body, but they 
also have a work of their own in the building up of the nitro- 
genous tissues, muscles, tendons, cartilage, etc., in which none 
of the other ingredients can share. 
THE CARBOHYDRATES, 
- of which we have familiar examples in sugar, starch, and cellu- 
lose, differ from the albuminoids in that they have no nitrogen. 
They have, according to’ the best experimental evidence, no 
share in the formation of nitrogenous tissues in the body. It is 
hardly. probable that they are transferred into fats to any con- 
siderable extent ; their chief use seems to be to supply fuel for 
the production of animal heat, and very probably of muscular 
power. They are very important constituents of foods, but 
much less so than the albuminoids and fats. They occur in only 
minute proportion in meats, fish, and like animal foods. Weare 
well acquainted with 
THE FATS, 
as they occur in vegetable fats and oils, like linseed and olive 
oils, in fat meat, tallow and lard, and in butter. The fats, like 
the carbohydrates, are destitute of nitrogen. The fats of the 
food we eat are stored in the body as fats, transformed into car- 
bo-hydrates, and serve for fuel, but do not form nitrogenous 
tissue. They are more valuable than the carbo-hydrates, because 
they are richer in carbon and hydrogen, the elements which give 
value to fuel, and because they supply the body with fats. 
