Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 35.djvu/823

Rh meat, because it withdraws not only salts of importance, but proteids and the extractives—nitrogenous and other. Beef-tea is valuable chiefly because of these extractives, though it also contains a little gelatin, albumin, and fats. Salt meat furnishes less nutriment, a large part having been removed by the brine; notwithstanding, all persons at times, and some frequently, find such food highly beneficial, the effect being doubtless not confined to the alimentary tract.

Meat, according to the heat employed, may be so cooked as to retain the greater part of its juices within it or the reverse. With a high temperature (65° to 70° C.) the outside in roasting may be so quickly hardened as to retain the juices.

In feeding dogs it is both physiological and economical to give the animal the broth as well as the meat itself. The poor man may get excellent food cheaply by using not alone the meat of the shank of beef, but the soup (extractives) derived from it. There is much waste not only by the consumption of more food than is necessary, but by the purchase of kinds in which that important class, the proteids, comes at too high a price.

It is remarkable in the highest degree that man's appetite, or the instinctive choice of food, has proved wiser than our science. It would be impossible even yet to match, by calculations based on any data we can obtain, a diet for each man equal upon the whole to what his instincts prompt. With the lower mammals we can prescribe with greater success. At the same time chemical and physiological science can lay down general principles based on actual experience, which may serve to correct some artificialities acquired by perseverance in habits that were not based on the true instincts of a sound body and a healthy mental and moral nature; for the influence of the latter can not be safely ignored even in such discussions as the present. These remarks, however, are meant to be suggestive rather than exhaustive.

We may with advantage inquire into the nature of hunger and thirst. These, as we know, are safe guides usually in eating and drinking.

After a long walk on a warm day one feels thirsty; the mouth is usually dry; at all events, moistening the mouth, especially the back of it (pharynx), will of itself partially relieve thirst. But if we remain quiet for a little time the thirst grows less, even if no fluid be taken. The dryness has been relieved by the natural secretions. If, however, fluid be introduced into the blood either directly or through the alimentary canal, the thirst is also relieved speedily. The fact that we know when to stop drinking water shows of itself that there must be local sensations that guide us, for it is not possible to believe that the whole of the fluid taken can at once have entered the blood.