56 



fact found that dialysis will not remove the lime from serum albumin, 

 though it removes the greater part of the sodium and potassium salts." 



The great importance of calcium salts for the various organs of ani- 

 mals is also illustrated by the empirical knowledge gained by physi- 

 cians. Thus a prominent medical work^ states: "Calcium chlorid is 

 used with benefit as an internal remedy in the various manifestations 

 of the strumous diathesis. It often causes the resolution of glandular 

 enlargements and the calcification of tubercular deposits, aids the 

 cicatrization of ulcerating cavities, and has proved curative in eczema 

 and lupus. It is highly praised in i^hthisis, also in chorea, and for the 

 colliquative diarrhoea of strumous children. In solution used exter- 

 nally as a fomentation it is said to hasten the maturation of boils." In 

 direct contact with the heart, however, this salt is not harmless, as 

 shown by the experiments with a frog's heart. Probably a hydrolytic 

 dissociation, with liberation of hydrochloric acid, however shght it 

 might be, brings on the injurious eli'ect.^ 



Munk^ observed during the inanition of men and dogs a gradual 

 increase of the lime secreted In the urine. Katsuyama^ noticed in 

 observations on starving rabbits in the first four days a gradual decrease 

 and afterwards a slow increase of lime in the urine, while there was a 

 gradual and steady decrease of magnesia. This decrease of magnesia, 

 compared with the increase of lime, is very significant and instructive.-^ 



PROPORTIONS OF LIME AND MAGNESIA IN ANIMAL ORGANISMS. 



The muscJe fibrillae of the mammalia are made up principally of the 

 contractile substan ce, or, as Kupffer has called it, the dynamoplast. The 

 energide (the nucleus with its connected cytoplasm), which manufac- 

 tures the fibrillse, occupies but a small volume within the dynamoplast, 

 hence the writer's hypothesis would suggest the inference that the 

 lime content of muscular masses should be less than that of glandu- 

 lar masses, since the relative mass of the nucleus in muscles is much 

 smaller than in glands. From Katz's analyses the following data will 

 show how far this view is confirmed.*^ 



1 Potter, O. L., Handbook of Materia Medica, Pharmacy, and Therapeutics, Phila- 

 delphia. 



" Calcium hydrate introduced iu man or dog tends to the secretion of calcium 

 carbamate in the urine, as Abel has demonstrated. This is of special physiological 

 interest, since carbamic acid is the precursor of urea, as Xencki and Drechsel have 

 shown. 



=^Suppl. zu Virchow's Arch., Vol. CLI. 



^Zeitsch. f. Phys. Chem., 1899, Vol. XXVI. • 



•'It may be pointed out here that lime compounds also seem to play an important 

 role in the coagulation of the blood, as this can be prevented by the addition of some 

 soluble oxalate. Myosin, which possibly plays a part in the coagulation of the 

 muscular plasm,. also contains lime. Moreover the actions of rennet and of pectase 

 are connected with the presence of lime. 



6 Pflug. Arch., Vol. LXIII, p. 1 . 



