SYNOPSIS OP CONTINENTAL VETERINARY JOURNALS. 153 
The Effects of Food devoid of Calcareous Matter on 
the Nutrition of Bones. By MM. G. & C. Voit. 
—In experiments undertaken to elucidate this important 
question the authors determined the amount of lime con¬ 
tained in the food and that expelled in the excrements. 
Also they experimented sometimes with young and still 
growing animals, and sometimes with adult fully-grown 
subjects. Two different conclusions were found to be 
possible :—(1) the organs and fluids requiring the quantity of 
lime salts necessary to them removed it from the bony tissue ; 
thus, while the rest of the economy remained in its physio¬ 
logically efficient state the hones became diseased; (2) or 
else the bony tissue retaining the calcareous matter with 
more energy than the other organs, death occurred before the 
skeleton had undergone any appreciable change. These 
being the possibilities, MM. Voit obtained the following 
results :—Young animals with imperfectly formed skeleton 
suffer more from deprivation of lime than adults, and directly 
in proportion to their size. Young dogs, fed exclusively on 
fat and flesh, became excessively rachitic, without any other 
modification of the general nutrition; the muscles exhibited 
a normal development, and the fatty tissue was regularly 
distributed and abundant. The disease consisted in an in¬ 
flammation of the parts of the bones in which growth 
occurs, and especially in the most freely movable rays of 
the lime. A similar process occurs, even though the aliment 
contains sufficient lime, when, from any cause, such as dis¬ 
turbance of digestion or use of too great quantities of princi¬ 
ples tending to increase the amount of excrements, a small 
proportion only of the lime in the food is absorbed. Of 
two adult pigeons of the same age, one was fed with grains 
of washed wheat and distilled water, the other with wheat 
grains and ordinary water rich in lime salts. At the end of 
the year no difference, either in the nutritive state of the 
body or in the weight, was perceptible; but some months 
afterwards the former had a fracture of the wing bone, with¬ 
out having wasted away nor presented the least sign of ill- 
health. Autopsy showed very advanced osteoporosis, but 
no rachitis. The bones in general were affected, but es¬ 
pecially those almost or totally immovable. The same 
result has been obtained by Chossat in his celebrated ex¬ 
periments, he having found the bones of the cranium and 
the sternum in the condition of very thin layers, rendered 
sieve-like by openings. Lehmann has made certain re¬ 
searches on the same subject. He found that a young pig, 
fed for 126 days solely on potatoes, became affected with 
