1294 
fc 
Vbt RURAL NEW-YORKER 
September 6, 1919 
Mas Farm Powder. 
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7 
The Story of the Vitamines 
A Thorough Discussion of the Vital 
Principles of Food 
Fart III. 
The Water-Soluble Vitamine.— Our 
present knowledge of the water-soluble 
vitamine has been obtained almost ex¬ 
clusively, from experiments made with 
albino rats. Few satisfactory investiga¬ 
tions have boon made with other species 
of animals. In connection with studies 
of the human disease known as beriberi, 
which has been found to ho due to a too 
exclusive diet of polished rice, which con¬ 
tains no water-soluble vitamines, a great 
many experiments have been made with 
fowls and pigeons. These birds, fed ex¬ 
clusively on polished rice, soon develop 
peculiar nervous symptoms, similar in 
many respects to those of human beriberi, 
and it has been believed that these were 
due solely to a diet deficient in the water- 
soluble vitamine. This belief is founded 
on the fact that almost everything which 
cures polyneuritis in pigeons also pro¬ 
motes the growth of young rats, and as 
the water-soluble vitamine is present in 
all these things it has been assumed that 
tlm water-soluble vitamine is the agent 
which cures the neuritic symptoms. While 
| various products obtained from yeast and 
I other substances rich in the water-soluble 
j vitamine cure the nervous symptoms in 
birds, these do not enable them to regain 
lost weight or prevent death within a com¬ 
paratively short time, as does the entire 
yeast. Thus it is probable that the ner¬ 
vous symptoms are cured by some factor 
in the diet other than the water-soluble 
vitamine. The experiments with birds, 
therefore, have a more limited application 
to. the problem of the water-soluble vita¬ 
mine than is assumed at present by many 
investigators. Owing to these facts much 
confusion has been introduced into the 
literature of the water-soluble vitamine, 
and until this tangle is straightened out 
the reader must expect to encounter con¬ 
tradictory and puzzling statements in the 
scientific literature as well as in the 
public press. These facts are mentioned 
here to show how much remains to be 
learned about the very elements of this 
important problem. 
Indirect Evidence. —Although little 
satisfactory experimental evidence has 
been offered to show that other species 
than the rat require the water-soluble 
vitamine, there is a great deal of indirect 
evidence which supports the belief that 
all mammals must have this factor in 
their food. The experiments of Loeb and 
Northrop make it not improbable that 
even insects need the water-soluble vita- 
mine for their growth and maintenance. 
Assuming that all animals, including man, 
require a sufficient amount of the water- 
soluble vitamine in their daily food if the 
young are to grow normally or the adult 
are to be maintained in health, the sub¬ 
ject of the. effect of this food factor on 
the well-being of the animal becomes a 
matter of the greatest -practical impor¬ 
tance. 
Further Experiments. —Young rats 
fed on diets as free from the water- 
soluble vitamine as it has been possible 
to make them, begin to decline in weight 
after about a week, and die in about six 
weeks, with a loss of about 40 per cent 
of their original weight. Although during 
the first week or two they eat enough 
food, later their appetite fails and they 
gradually oat less and less. During this 
time they rarely manifest any obvious 
symptoms of physiological disorders until 
just before death when, of course, they 
are very weak. If enough water-soluble 
vitamine is added to the food, even though 
the animal appears about to die. recovery 
results in a marvelously short time. With¬ 
in a few hours appetite returns and 
strength is gained, with complete recov¬ 
ery of lost weight and vigor within a 
comparatively few days. The food intake 
during the first week after the addition 
of the vitamine is often three or four 
times greater than during the previous 
week. If less than enough of the vita¬ 
mine is given recovery is slower, if more 
than enough no harm is done. The amount 
of the water-soluble vitamine needed to 
accomplish this miraculous rescue from 
death is extremely small, only three grains 
of dried brewer’s yeast daily usually being 
needed for a rat. Since certainly more 
than 95 per cent of the yeast is made up 
of substances other than this vitamine. it 
is clear that very small quantities produce 
wonderful effects. That too much water- 
soluble vitamine in the food does no 
harm is shown by the fact that when 
yeast is fed as a source of protein, so 
that more than 10 times as much water- 
soluble vitamine as is needed to promote 
normal parts is eaten daily, rats have 
grown normally and remained in health 
during the manv months they were thus 
fed. 
Physiological Effects. —We have in 
the water-soluble vitamine a substance 
exercising a remarkable effect on the 
physiological well-being of the animal. It 
nets just as if it were a stimulant to all 
the vital processes, without which life is 
impossible. Without its presence in the 
food all of these processes gradually slow 
down until death occurs. With its pres¬ 
ence in the food all of these processes are 
set going and life proceeds normally. That 
the animal suffers from no profound 
pathological changes in its tissues is indi¬ 
cated by the very rapid recoveries made 
after adding the water-soluble vitamine. 
Apparently no permanent harm is caused 
by the lack of this dietary factor, unless 
during the. period of enfeeblement caused 
by the deficient food some infectious disease 
attacks the animal. It is interesting to 
contrast the physiological effects on the 
animal of the vitamines with those of 
toxic substances. When we give a poison, 
the condition of the animal becomes worse 
the greater amount administered until 
finally the dose is sufficient to kill, where¬ 
as with the vitamine the condition of the 
animal becomes worse the smaller the 
amount administered and death results 
when none at all is given. We thus have 
phenomena of an entirely new order to 
deal with in studying the various physi¬ 
cs 1 ™! problems raised by the discovery 
of these peculiar factors in our foods 
Effects on Nutrition.— The water- 
soluble vitamine is needed not only for 
the growth of the young, but also for the 
maintenance of adults. This vitamine has 
often boon called the growth vitamine, be- 
cause its effect on nutrition is most ap¬ 
parent. when young animals are the sub¬ 
ject of experiment. It might more prop¬ 
erly be called the maintenance vitamine, 
except for the fact that all of the known 
types of vitamines are apparently neces¬ 
sary for proper nutrition at. every age. 
Much remains to be learned concerning 
the part played by the water-soluble 
vitamine in nutrition before the prac¬ 
tical import of this food factor is 
fully appreciated. I have already 
called attention in my earlier paper 
to the relations of this subject to infant 
feeding. The same considerations apply 
also to the raising of calves on substitutes 
for tlieir mother’s milk. Some oxperi-. 
ments tried on rats indicate that a quan¬ 
tity of vitamine in the diet sufficient to 
promote satisfactory growth, but prob¬ 
ably much loss than is supplied bv a nor¬ 
mal diet, resulted in infertility. ‘ A con¬ 
siderable number of rats thus reared 
failed to breed and microscopic examina¬ 
tion of their reproductive organs showed 
that these had not developed normally. 
Tf feeding influences fertilitv it is impor¬ 
tant for the agriculturist 'to know the 
reason. 
Effects on Posterity. —What effect 
on the second or subsequent generations 
is. produced by a deficiency of this vita¬ 
mine in the diet should also be studied. 
In one of our experiments we fed rats 
on a diet containing 92 per cent of whole 
wheat, five per cent of butter fat and 
three per cent of mineral salts. On this 
diet the animals not only grew well for 
more than a year, but also produced sev¬ 
eral broods of young. Some of the latter 
are now over a year old, active and ap¬ 
parently well, but they are less than one- 
half as large as they should be. It is 
not impossible that this small size is duo 
to an insufficiency of either the water- 
soluble or the antiscorbutic factor in the 
diet of the parents. Here is another prob¬ 
lem for which the farmer should demand 
an answer. 
The Food Factor.— He should also 
know whether the water-soluble vitamine 
is transmitted from the food of the cow 
to the milk. In other words, does the 
efficiency of the milk as a source of the 
water-soluble vitamine depend on the con¬ 
tent of this food factor in the ration of 
the cow? McCollum and also Drummond 
believe that it does, but in the experiments 
they made with the rats to support this 
view it was not possible to determine the 
amount of milk supplied by the mother. 
Satisfactory experiments should be made 
with larger animals from which the milk 
c^n be drawn and measured. 
THOMAS B. OSBORNE. 
(Continued Next Week) 
Coming Farmers’ Meetings 
Vegetable Growers of America, annual 
convention, Detroit, Mich.. Sept. 9-13, 
Eastern States Exposition. Eastern 
Berkshire Congress, Springfield. Mass., 
Sept. 15-19. 
Windsor County Agricultural Society, 
seventy-fourth annual fair, Woodstock, 
Vt.. Sept. 16-18. 
Union Agricultural Association, sixty- 
fourth annual fair, Burgettstown, Pa., 
Sept. 30-Oet. 1-12. 
New England Fruit Show, with Rhode 
Island Fruit Growers’ Association, Elks 
Auditorium, Providence, B. I.. Nov. 10-13. 
National Grange, annual meeting, 
Grand Rapids. Mich., Nov. 12. 
Greater Arizona State Fair, Phoenix, 
Dec. 3-8. 
New Jersey State Horticultural So¬ 
ciety, annual meeting, Atlantic City, 
Dec. 1-3. 
Virginia State Horticultural Society, 
annual meeting. Roanoke. Dec. 2-4. 
Virginia State Corn Growers, annual 
convention and exhibit, Roanoke, Va., 
Dee. 2-4. 
National Farmers’ Exposition and Ohio 
Apple Show. Terminal Auditorium, To¬ 
ledo, Ohio, Dec. 112. 
Peninsula Horticultural Society, thirty- 
fourth annual meeting, Cliestertown. Md., 
Jan. 0-8, 1920. 
“Why do you want to sell this mule. 
Uncle Ned?” “Boss, I wants to git rid o’ 
dat mule.” “Of course you do. but why?” 
“Well, -hit’s dis way. I done got de 
rheumatism an’ ’sides I ain’t as spry as 
I used to he. nohow. If I keeps foolin’ 
roun’ dat mule, some o’ des days lie’s 
gwine to kick whar I is an’ I’se gwine 
to be dar.”—San Francisco Chronicle. 
