139 
The following propositions sum up the results obtained : — 
1. The primary and direct efl’ect of a meal was to lower 
the acidity of the urine. Sometimes the depression was 
slight, but more frequently the urine became neutral or 
alkaline. 
2. After breakfast, the greatest depression occurred at the 
second hour, and the period of depression continued between 
two and four hours. 
3. After dinner, the greatest depression took place at the 
third, fourth, and fifth hours, and lasted from four to six hours. 
The effect after dinner was stronger as well as more prolonged 
than after breakfast. 
4. 'rhe urine became neutral or actually alkaline, after 
breakfast, twenty-three days out of thirty-eight; it became 
neutral or alkaline, after dinner, thirty-three days out of 
thirty-seven. * 
5. The effect of an ordinary mixed diet, and of purely 
animal diet, seemed almost identical. Vegetable diet, on the 
contrary, had decidedly a slighter effect ; and unless it was 
used exclusively for some days in succession, the depression 
did not reach the neutral line. 
6. After the period of depressed acidity had passed off the 
acidity of the urine rose again, so that at the ninth and tenth 
hours after a meal it was higher than before the meal. It was 
also invariably found that the morning urine was more acid 
when supper was taken the night before, than when the 
subject of experiment went to bed fasting. 
7. Although, therefore, the primary effect of a meal was to 
depress the acidity of the urine, the secondary and remote 
effect was exactly the reverse. 
8. This remote effect of a previous meal was found 
frequently to interfere with the j)rimary effect of a recent 
meal. For this reason, the urine after breakfast rarely 
reached the neutral line if a hearty supper was taken the 
night before. 
