Page:Philosophical Transactions - Volume 001.djvu/333

 accidentally, as by a Contusion, &c. it be extravasated; in which case my Argument will not be injured, because the part is depraved, whereas I speak of the parts, as they are in their natural state.

To confirm and illustrate all which, I desire, that the following familiar Observations may be considered:

1. If a Horse, fat and fair to look on, without a hollow to be seen between his Muscles, be rid extreme hard, and into a great sweat, and then kept one day without water or moist meat, you shall see him look so thin in many places, as in musculous parts, that you will hardly beleive it to be the same Horse, especially if he be (as the phrase is among Horse-masters) a Nash or Wash-Horse. The cause of which thinness will easily be granted to be only an exhastion of Juice, expended out of the Blood, which did stuff out these Vessels. And whoever, that is used to ride hard, shall observe, how thick this foul Horse breaths, and at what a rate he will reek and sweat, will not much wonder at the alteration. But if the Horse be a hardy one, and used to be hard ridden, then you will see, that one days rest, and his belly full of good meat and drink, will in one day or two almost restore him to his former plight, the food being within that short space of time so distributed, that all the Vessels will be replenish'd again, as before. And the cleaner the Horse is, the sooner recruited, and the less sign of hard riding will appear. This seems to shew the facility, with which the Juice, called Blood, passeth; Which surely, if there were such a thing as a Parenchyma, might by several accidents (not difficult to mention) be so deprav'd in several parts of it, that it might lose its receptive faculty; than which it may be thought to have none of greater use, being supposed to be without Vessels.

2.Discoursing sometimes with Grasiers in the Country, about the Pasture of Cattle, I have been informed by them, that, if they buy any Old Beasts, Oxen, or Cows, to feed, they choose rather those that are as poor, as can be, so they be found; because that, if they are pretty well in flesh, what they then add to them by a good pasture, though it make them both look and sell well, yet it will not make them eat so well, their flesh proving hard and verry tough: Which some may suppose to be the age of Parenchyma; and so it is of that so called. But if those Beasts be old and extremely poor, then they feed very kindly, and will be not only very fat, but spend well, like young ones, and eat very tender.

Of which I take the reason (excluding a Parencbyma now) to be this. When an Oxe or a Cow is grown old, and in an indifferent plight as to his flesh (for so it is call'd) all those Vessels having been kept at that size for the most part, have contracted a tenseness and fermness, and their fibers less extensive, not so fitted for the reception of more unctuous particles to relaxe them; and that additional unctuous matter, which occasions fatness, is forced to seek new quarter, any where (often remote from Muscles) where it can be with least difficulty received; sometimes to one place, sometimes to Rh