In the last few years histamine has been the subject of numerous studies. These studies, by Bockus and Bank,1 Carnot, Libert and Koskowski,2 Dobson,3 Gutowski,4 Matheson and Ammon,5 Popielski6 and Rothlin and Gundlach,7 among others, made it evident that histamine, introduced either into the subcutaneous or into the intramuscular tissue, has a very pronounced stimulating action on the gastric secretion and chiefly on the secretion of free hydrochloric acid. I had the opportunity of contributing to the study of this property of histamine when Choisy and I8 recorded the results of our personal experience.
In view of this well established pharmacologic action of histamine, it seemed to me logical to assume that, because of the increase of acidity in the stomach secretion, a corresponding general decrease of acidity should take place in all other body fluids. With such a possibility in mind