The depth of color of diabetic urine is inversely as the quantity passed. Hence, when this is very large the urine is pale, and even almost colorless, but it may still contain considerable amounts of sugar and possess a decided color, quite as deep as that of urine passed in smaller quantity. When exposed to the air, diabetic urine becomes rapidly turbid from the growth of fungi, including the yeast fungus and penicilium glaucum. The odor of diabetic urine just passed is usually in no way peculiar, but as fermentation progresses an acetous odor is developed, which is ascribed to acetic acid. At other times the odor is quite peculiar, being spoken of as vinous or compared to that of sour beer, stale fruit, alcohol, chloroform, or, as by one of my patients, to sweetbrier. Diabetic urine has almost invariably an acid reaction, which becomes more decided as fermentation progresses. As a consequence of this increased acidity, and sometimes independent of fermentation-changes, the urine deposits a sediment of uric acid, but with this exception diabetic urine is generally free from sediment. Diabetic patients on a meat diet sometimes have a good deal of uric acid from this source. Albuminuria may coexist with glycosuria, but is not generally found until late in the disease, after changes in the kidney begin to make their {209} appearance, unless, as may happen, glycosuria supervenes upon primary renal disease. Alcohol and acetone, or an acetone-yielding substance--aceto-acetic acid--are sometimes found in diabetic urine. They are products of the breaking up of sugar, but chemists do not explicitly agree as to the exact method in which acetone originates in the organism. First recognized in the distillate of urine and blood of a diabetic patient by Petters[28] through its physical properties, odor, combustibility, etc., rather than by actual isolation, it was further investigated by Kaulich,[29] Gerhardt,[30] Rupstein,[31] and Markownikoff,[32] who obtained it in an impure state from urine; by Deichmüller and Tollens,[33] whose isolated substance was pure, and finally most recently by Jaksch[34] and Penzoldt.[35] The former found it not only in diabetic urine, but also in that of fever, and even of carcinoma. The latter found it by the indigo test in but 18 out of 22 diabetics, and by the iodoform test, either decidedly or feebly, in 20 out of 20; in 3 out of 11 cases of typhoid fever, in 6 out of 7 cases of pneumonia, in none of 6 cases of phthisis, in 1 out of 3 cases of measles, and in 1 case of cerebro-spinal meningitis. Finally, v. Jaksch has been led to believe, from his extensive investigations, that acetone is a constant and normal product of tissue-change, although Penzoldt considers such conclusion scarcely justified. [Footnote 28: _Prager Vierteljahrschrift_, xiv. 3, 1857, S. 88.] [Footnote 29: _Ibid._, xvii. 3, 1860, S. 59.] [Footnote 30: _Wiener Med. Presse_, No. 28, 1865.]