It is a well-established fact that symptoms of gastric irritation similar to those of hyperacidity may occur not only when the acid of the gastric secretion is excessive, but often when it is normal or subnormal. Stockton1 pointed this out in a paper read before this Association, in 1902, and explained the condition by assuming that there was a hyperesthesia of the gastric mucous membrane which caused it to be intolerant, not only of abnormally large amounts of acid, but often of a normal or subnormal amount, or, as he put it, persons without an excess of acid had symptoms of hyperacidity.
My object in presenting this communication is to confirm Stockton's observations and I propose going a step farther to show that excess of acid alone is not capable of producing the symptoms of gastric irritation seen in so-called hyperacidity. There must be some other condition present which