ABERRATION OF THE APPETITE. 



We shall formulate our opinions thus : 



In certain cases osteomalacia is the cause of licking (pica). But 

 these two affections, coexisting sometimes in the same individual, 

 are really two different morbid states. In practice we meet the 

 disease pica without any existing osteomalacia. The close rela- 

 tionship of these two nutritive troubles being given, it is probable 

 that one and the same cause may sometimes produce the one and 

 sometimes the other. 



7. The principal occasional cause of pica must be looked for in 

 the food and in the composition of the soil. In most cases the 

 affection is certainly the result of the absence or insufficiency of 

 certain principles, notably of nutritive salts, in the alimentary 

 matters. The qualifying value of these principles and these salts 

 are not yet determined. Nessler's researches (analyses of hay and 

 water) have especially shown the absence of soda salts. He veri- 

 fied these facts in the Black Forest during the years 1861, 1867, 

 and 1868. His observations concerning the absence of phosphate 

 of lime in food refer to osteomalacia, of which he has also studied 

 the pathology. 



The primary indications concerning the relations existing be- 

 tween the appearance of pica and the alimentation given to 

 animals are of a general order and very vague. All the poor 

 and indigestible food ; coarse, washed, or muddy hay, harvested 

 too late ; too much feeding of straw ; swampy and turfy meadows, 

 water rushes, the cyperacese (Cyperus, Scirpus, Carex), the different 

 varieties of dock, etc , as well as the feeding of malt, slops, fer- 

 mented nutriments, potatoes, turnips, and want or excess of sea- 

 salt, have all been charged as being tlie cause of the trouble. 

 Haubner went so far as to attribute the development of the 

 affection to the action of certain vegetable species (Meum atha- 

 manticum, AcMllea millefolium^ Alehemilla vulgwis, etc.). This 

 last etiological conception, altogether hypothetic, has been abso- 

 lutely negatived by Lemke's experience. 



Licking-disease must be considered as the expression of several 

 conditions of inanition, but especially of humoral anomalies, result- 

 ing mostly from the absence or insufficient quantity of certain 

 saline matters in the food ; these auomalies may also be the cause 

 of digestive troubles, intestinal catarrh, and probably also of 

 osteomalacia. Without regard to the cause, as soon as the anomal- 

 ous condition exists the organism feels the need of remedying it ; 



