We may recognize in these statements a physiological demand for a certain amount of salt, especially when vegetable foods enter into the daily dietary, but there is no justification for the employment of such quantities as are generally made use of. Where the vegetable food is largely rice, a small fraction of a gram of salt is really sufficient for all physiological purposes; and in those cases where ordinary cereals, legumes, potatoes, etc., constitute the chief part of the dietary, a few grams of salt, at the most, will suffice to meet the daily needs. Common usage, however, frequently raises the amount consumed to 25 grams or more per day, the bulk of which is at once eliminated through the kidneys; thereby entailing a certain amount of renal activity, which must, it would seem, constitute something of a strain upon organs ordinarily hard worked at the best. “Do we not impose too great a task upon them, and may it not be fraught with serious consequences? When on a diet of meat and bread, without salt, we excrete not more than from 6 to 8 grams of alkaline salts in twenty-four hours. With a diet of potatoes, and a corresponding addition of salt, over 100 grams of alkaline salts pass through the kidneys in the day. May not there be danger in this? The habit of drinking spirituous liquors, which moreover is reckoned one of the causes of chronic nephritis, also brings about the immoderate use of salt, and thus one sin against nature leads to another” (Bunge). The moral we would draw (from these observations) is that in weakened conditions of the kidneys there is reason in reducing the rate of proteid exchange to the lowest level consistent with the maintenance of equilibrium and the preservation of strength and vigor, thereby diminishing the amount of nitrogenous waste to be eliminated and the consequent strain upon these organs. Further, there is suggested moderation in the amount of salt to be used daily, and some circumspection in the amount and quality of vegetable foods consumed in order to regulate more effectually the quantity of saline waste to be handled by the kidneys. These conclusions are just as worthy of consideration as the more obvious rule that in diabetes or glycosuria proper precaution must be observed in the eating of carbohydrate foods. In gout and rheumatism, accumulated physiological knowledge teaches plainly the necessity of avoiding those foods that are rich in purin-containing compounds. Uric acid owes its origin in part at least to substances of this class; and as an ounce of prevention is worth more than a pound of cure, we may by proper moderation in the use of such foods save ourselves from the disagreeable effects of accumulated uric acid deposits.