224  Animal  and  Vegetable  Ferments.  {Am>iayjf9£arm- 
ANIMAL  AND  VEGETABLE  FERMENTS. 
By  William  B.  Thompson.  ~ 
A  close  examination  of  the  functions  of  animals  and  plants  or 
vegetables  will  reveal  an  analogy  which  becomes  a  highly  interest- 
ing subject  of  study.  The  exact  operations  of  the  assimilative  pro- 
cesses of  plants,  with  their  food-supply,  are  but  meagrely  understood 
or  appreciated.  In  our  own  economies,  we  have  reached  some  de- 
ductions which  have  proven  great  aids  to  physiological  and  medical 
science.  The  conversion  of  food  into  conditions  in  which  it  can  be 
appropriated  and  become  part  of  the  living  structure  of  animals  and 
plants  is  accomplished,  by  processes  which,  whilst  they  are  exceed- 
ingly complex,  yet  are  not,  perhaps,  beyond  the  possible  limits  of 
our  knowledge.  The  fermentative  processes  favored  by  natural  or 
artificial  warmth  and  heat,  and  which  are  protected  from  destructive 
organic  changes,  seem  to  be  one  of  the  prime  essentials  in  the  wisely 
established  scheme  of  the  Creator  for  the  supply  of  nutrition. 
Whilst  we  may  be  able  to  effect  some  approximation  to  such 
change,  by  artificial  methods,  outside  of  these  respective  economies — 
animal  and  vegetable — yet  we  cannot  penetrate  into  the  living 
organisms  and  disclose  exactly  the  intricate  operations  by  which 
these  are  conducted.  Therefore,  we  must,  in  a  measure,  grope  and 
reach  conclusion  by  logical  deduction  and  observation. 
Comparisons  have  been  instituted  between  the  peptic  ferment  of 
animal  origin  and  its  analogue  as  found  in  the  juices  of  the  Carica 
Papaya  and  the  Fructus  Carica.  These  comparisons  have  led  to 
some  interesting  statements  and  observations,  which  deserve  thought 
and  attention,  and  should  be  taken  up  by  the  students  of  science,  in 
which  pharmacy  can  always  find  a  legitimate  sphere.  In  applying 
to  both  ferments  their  soluble  action  on  albumen,  we  find,  as  usual, 
the  pepsin  active  in  the  presence  of  egg-albumen  in  acidified  media, 
whilst  the  evaporated  vegetable  juices,  brought  to  a  solid  state,  seem 
to  act  but  feebly,  if  appreciably  at  all,  upon  the  same  substance — i.  e., 
egg-albumen — under  like  circumstances.  Now,  it  is  asserted  that 
egg-albumen  is  an  albuminate  of  calcium,  and  that  we  have  no  abso- 
lutely pure  and  isolated  albumen.  If  the  former  be  true — and  it 
seems  rational — a  secret  of  the  operation  of  pepsin  in  the  weak  acid 
(hydrochloric)  solution  may  be  better  understood.  If  we  consider 
for  a  moment,  in  this  connection,  that  the  chick  derives  its  whole 
