CAUSES OF ALBUMINOUS URINE. 229 
to the circulation of the blood, or a malformation of the heart, 
prevents the heematosis from being as rapid as under ordinary 
circumstances. The urine is likewise albuminous in idiopathic 
or traumatic lesions of the nervous centres, which cause a lower¬ 
ing of temperature, and thereby a marked decrease of combus¬ 
tion ; in diabetes, a disease where very often a lesion of the 
nervous centre seems to be the origo mali ; where the great 
abundance of sugar in the blood seems to be an obstacle to the 
combustion of albumen; and where, finally, the natural heat is 
lowered by one or two degrees with patients who are severely 
affected. The urine is albuminous in that kind of nervous ex¬ 
haustion which characterizes the state of frame called lumbago, 
which exhaustion must be connected with a great diminution of 
calorification, and slow combustion. The urine is likewise albu¬ 
minous in consequence of severe exposure to cold of a large 
surface of the body. Finally, Bright’s disease, where the urine 
is always albuminous and anaemic, is especially attributed to 
many of the causes which have been above enumerated as ca¬ 
pable of exciting the passage of albumen into the urine. 
The author continues, by stating that some useful data may be 
obtained from comparative physiology. As a general rule, the 
urine of the common mammalia and of birds contains no albu¬ 
men. Among reptiles, on the other hand, the batrachia, so re¬ 
markable for the low temperature of their animal heat, yield 
urine in which albumen is always to be found. It now remains 
to be proved, says M. Robin, that the urine becomes albuminous 
under the influence of such agents as interfere in a marked de¬ 
gree with slow combustion. The author then adduces the 
following conclusions :— 
When the activity of the combustion which takes place in 
the blood, is too feeble to burn the whole of the albumen which, 
in the normal state, should be consumed in a given time, the 
general vitality is diminished, and thus more or less albumen is 
allowed to pass unaltered into the urine; viz. just so much 
organic matter as escapes the transformation into urea or uric 
acid. The proportion of urea contained in albuminous urine 
should, therefore, be smaller than it is found in normal urine, and 
such is found to be the case in the following diseases, the only 
ones, according to the author, in which experiments have been 
made ; viz., pulmonary phthisis, diseases of cerebro-spinal axis, 
extensive and acute bronchitis with intense dyspnoea, and 
Bright’s disease. 
Lancet , Jan. 24, 1852. 
