462 Hydrochloric Aeid in the Gastric Contents in Cancer. — 
under conditions of disease, and if this be so, then another element of 
uncertainty is introduced into its determination, however rigid the conditions 
of the experiment may be. 
Dr. Bashford has stated* that on the basis of observations made on almost 
3000 mice with propagated cancerous tumours during two years, “the 
conclusion has been arrived at that the presence of a tumour even of greater 
weight than the mouse itself does not necessarily involve a disturbance 
of the normal nutrition which could be regarded as comparable to the 
cachexia frequently associated with malignant new growths in the human 
subject.” 
But inasmuch as recent extensive statistics, collected by the Imperial 
Cancer Research Fundt from various London hospitals, have shown that 
cachexia is not a constant accompaniment of cancer in man, might we not 
expect to. find the same compensating influence as regards increased or 
undiminished secretion of hydrochloric acid in the stomachs of human beings 
affected with this disease ? 
It is certainly clear from our experiments, so far as they go, that the 
percentage of physiologically active hydrochloric acid in the gastric contents 
of mice and rats is, on the whole, slightly greater when they are the subject 
of cancerous growths as compared with these animals under normal 
conditions ; and although we cannot, of course, from the comparatively 
few experiments made by us on the human subject, assert that the secretion 
of hydrochloric acid in cancer is normal (for in a few cases it was decidedly 
below normal), yet we think that we have sufficiently indicated that the 
whole question of the amount of hydrochloric acid in human gastric contents 
in cancer would repay further investigation, and that it is not justifiable, 
in the absence of more comparable experiments than those at present 
available, to conclude that it is always greatly diminished in the presence of 
this disease. 
In conclusion, our thanks are due to Mr. 8S. Bosworth for his able assistance, 
throughout the whole of this work, in the details of the numerous chemical 
estimations involved. 
* ‘Scientific Reports on the Investigations of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund,’ 
No. 2, 1905, p. 40. 
+ ‘Transactions of the Epidemiological Society of London’ (N.S.), vol. 26, 1906—7. 
