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DIGESTION IN THE STOMACH. 485
performed on* human beings with the same results.1
In these cases it is
evident that the digestive work of the stomach was taken up by the
intestine; but all food cannot be digested in these cases to the same
extent, and the connective tissue of meat especially is sometimes found
to a considerable extent undigested in the excrements.
It is a well-known fact that the contents of the stomach may be
kept without decomposing for some time by means of hydrochloric acid,
while, on the contrary, when the acid is neutralized a fermentation
commences by which lactic acid and other organic acids are formed.
According to Cohn, an amount of hydrochloric acid above 0.7 p. m.
completely arrests lactic-acid fermentation, even under otherwise favor-
able circumstances, and according to Strauss and Bialocour the limit
of lactic-acid fermentation lies at 1.2 p. m. hydrochloric acid united
to organic bodies. The hydrochloric acid of the gastric juice has unques-
tionably an antifermentative action, and also, like all dilute mineral
acids, an antiseptic action. This action is of importance, as many path-
ogenic micro-organisms may be destroyed by the gastric juice. The
common bacillus of cholera, certain streptococci, etc., are killed by the
gastric juice, while others, especially as spores, are unacted upon. The
fact that gastric juice can diminish or retard the action of certain tox-
albumins, such as tetanotoxine and diphtheria toxine, is also of great
interest (Nencki, Sieber, and Schoumowa 2
).
Because of this antifermentative and antitoxic action of gastric juice
it is considered that the principal importance of this juice lies in
its antiseptic action. The fact that intestinal putrefaction is not
increased on the extirpation of the stomach, as derived from experi-
ments made on man and animal,3
does not uphold this view.
Since the hydrochloric acid of the gastric juice prevents the con-
tents of the stomach from fermenting, with the generation of gas, those
gases which occur in the stomach probably depend, at least in great
measure, upon the swallowed air and saliva, and upon those gases gen-
erated in the intestine and returned through the pyloric valve. Planer
found in the stomach-gases of a dog 66-68 per cent N, 23-33 per cent
1
Czerny, cited from Bunge, Lehrbuch d. physiol. u. path. Chem. 4. Aufl., Theil 2,
173; Carvallo and Pachon, Arch. d. Physiol. (5), 7; Ogata, Arch. f. (Anat. u.) Physiol.
1883; Grohe, Arch. f. exp. Path. u. Pharm. 49; London and collaborators, Zeitschr.
f. physiol. Chem. 74, 328 (1911) ; in regard to the case in man, see Schlatter in
Wr6blewski, Centralbl. f. Physiol. 11, p. 665, and the surgical journals.
2
Cohn, Zeitschr. f. physiol. Chem., 14; Strauss and Bialocour, Zeitschr. f. klin.
Med., 28. See also Kiihne, Lehrb., 57; Bunge, I.ehrb. d. Physiol., 4. Aufl., 148 and
159; Hirschfeld, Pfliiger’s Arch., 47; Nencki, Sieber, and Schoumowa, Centralbl. f.
Bacterid., etc., 23. In regard to the action of gastric juice upon pathogenic microbes
we must refer the reader to hand-books of bacteriology.
3
See Carvallo and Pachon. 1. c, and Schlatter in Wr6blewski, 1. c.
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