39 
Results similar to the above were obtained in two experiments upon 
guinea pigs. Under the influence of alcohol the percentage of the 
ethereal sulphates increased from 1 or 2 to 30 or 37. 
Discussion . — The most striking effect of alcohol shown in the above 
tables is the increase in the excretion of the ethereal sulphates.® 
Yfe may now take up the question as to the probable cause of this 
increase. 
The views as to the significance of the ethereal sulphates are not in 
entire accord. For some time after their discovery by Baumann 
they were generally held to be an index of the amount of intestinal 
putrefaction. The correctness of this interpretation was, however, 
sometimes questioned. Thus Schfitz,^ in 1901, called attention to 
the fact that a variable amount of these products are excreted in the 
feces and that another part is destro}^ed in the organism; hence but 
a part of those formed appear in the urine. 
Yer}^ recently Folin ^ and Shaffer ^ have reported experiments 
tending to show that not all of the ethereal sulphate present in the 
urine comes from the absorption of the products of intestinal putre- 
faction. Thus Folin found the indican (one of the most prominent 
of the ethereal sulphates) to disappear from the urine entirely upon a 
starch and cream diet, wliile the absolute quantity of ethereal sul- 
phates was reduced only to about one-half of the amount eliminated 
on a nitrogen-rich diet. Folin concludes from this and other observa- 
tions: ‘‘The ethereal sulphates can only in part be due to intestinal 
putrefaction, and neither their absolute nor their relative amount 
can be accepted as an index of the extent to which putrefaction is 
taking place in the intestines.” Folin drew his conclusions from 
observations upon normal individuals. While they seem to show 
clearly that there is normally excreted some ethereal sulphate which 
is not connected with intestinal putrefaction, yet there seems to be 
nothing in them contrary to the view that when the ethereal sulphates 
are largely increased in pathological conditions this increase is not due 
chiefly to increased intestinal putrefaction. It may be added that 
V. Tabora ^ and Koziczkowsky,^ two of the latest writers on this 
« There was in nearly all cases a diminution in the total sulphate excretion. As 
the sulphate excretion is, generally speaking, parallel to the proteid katabolism, the 
above results indicate that a smaller amount of proteid was being katabolized under 
the influence of alcohol. In the absence of data concerning the intake of food, it is not 
possible to determine whether this result was due to the proteid-sparing power of the 
alcohol or to the animals eating less. 
&Arch. f. Verdauungskrank., v. 7, p. 43. 
c Amer. Journ. Physiol., v. 13, p. 99, 1905. 
d Ibid., V. 17, p. 380, 1906. 
e Dtsch. Arch. f. klin. Med., v. 87, p. 254, 1906. 
/ Zeit. f. klin. Med., v. 57, p. 413. 
