Volume 5

Alle de brieven van Antoni van Leeuwenhoek / uitgegeven, geïllustreerd en van aanteekeningen voorzien door een Commissie van Nederlandsche geleerden.

  • Antonie van Leeuwenhoek
Date:
1939-
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Alle de brieven van Antoni van Leeuwenhoek / uitgegeven, geïllustreerd en van aanteekeningen voorzien door een Commissie van Nederlandsche geleerden. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    that if these salts contained in wine and vinegar did not con¬ glomerate in the stomach and intestines, the urine or excrements of heavy wine drinkers would give off an odour of wine, though I will not deny that there may be some people in whose stomach and intestines the process is not powerful enough to cause the particles of salt in the vinegar to agglomerate or change shape, in which case not only vinegar but also wine would be harmful to such people. The vinegar which I take in my food almost daily has never caused me any discomfort; nor have I ever noticed any injurious effects from it upon my body. Contrarily, let me but drink a pint — that is \]/^ lbs.2‘) — of wine in the evening, and it produces a fever in me at night (if, that is, a strong, or more than ordinarily rapid heart-beat or pulse may be called a fever), especially if the wine is sweet and also heavy. I firmly believe that the only reason for this is that many of the sweet ingredients (which become thin in water and warmth) are transmitted to my blood, thus thickening it and slowing down its circulation so that the heart has to beat quicker and more powerfully, as I explained more fully on a previous occasion'^). This, however, does not hold true for our common salt and other salts; for, as far as our common salt is concerned, if a small quantity of it is put into water, it dis¬ integrates and each grain of salt is divided into millions of particles, which, however, retain an exactly square shape. If however, a more liberal quantity of salt is thrown into the water and a certain amount of evaporation is induced, the salt will again lump together into larger portions. Just as I said earlier that I have seen particles of our common salt a thousand million times smaller than a grain of sand, each of which was nevertheless a perfect square, so I Transmission of salts of wine into the blood, 27) A and B have pound. A Delft pound is approximately 475 grams, hence 134 pound is roughly 600 grams. That would make a pint of wine approximately 0.6 litre. (See also ibid. I, p. 385). [S.] 28) For these ideas see letter of 22 January 1683, p. 31 sqq.