74 THE WORK OF THE DIGESTIVE GLANDS. 



tion of gastric juice will always be obtained by the sham feeding experi- 

 ment, no matter what may be given it to eat, whether boiled or raw flesh, 

 bread or coagulated egg-white, &c. The dog, however, which has not 

 fasted, that is to say, has been fed fifteen to twenty hours before, will pick 

 and choose amongst the different foods, eating one with great greed, 

 tolerating another, and refusing altogether a third, and, corresponding 

 therewith, the amount and quality of the gastric juice will manifest 

 wide variations. The more eagerly the dog eats, the more juice will be 

 secreted and the greater the digestive power which it possesses. The 

 majority of dogs prefer flesh to bread, and correspondingly less juice 

 will be produced by sham feeding with bread than with flesh. Some- 

 times, however, we find dogs which will devour bread with greater 

 appetite than flesh. In these cases one obtains more and stronger 

 juice in sham feeding with bread than with flesh. Here is a case in 

 point : a dog is given boiled meat which has been cut into pieces of 

 definite size, and the piecfs follow each other at regular intervals 

 of time. The animal eats, but soon, from its behaviour, you fee that 

 it develops no particular greed for the meal, and this observation is con- 

 firmed by the fact that after fifteen to twenty minutes it ceases taking 

 the flesh. The secretion of juice has meanwhile either not begun at all, or 

 only after a longer interval than five minutes, and remains scanty to the 

 end. Now wait till the secretion has stopped and give the same dog raw 

 flesh, either forthwith or next clay, in pieces of the same size and at the 

 same rate as before. The raw meat tastes excellently to the dog, it eats 

 for hours at a time, the secretion of gastric juice begins precisely after 

 five minutes and is very active. With another dog which prefers boiled 

 to raw meat, exactly the reverse occurs. Broth, soup, milk towards 

 which dogs are usually more indifferent than towards solid food often 

 produce in sham feeding, either no secretion at all or only very little, 

 although broth, for instance, has essentially the same taste as fle-h. 



It is therefore clear that in sham feeding the psychic effect may readily 

 become an absolute and independent factor. All the conditions which we 

 enumerated above, and which are necessary for the successful production 

 of the psychic effect, hold good in combined form, for the sham feeding 

 experiment. The dog eats with greed before one's eyes, the food which 

 it receives is pleasant, it not only imagines food but actually eats it, and 

 has therefore no reason to feel offended, for naturally the idea does not 

 occur to any of the dogs that all their trouble is in vain. 



Consequently, in the sham feeding experiment, by the act of ealing, 

 the excitation of the nerves of the gastric glands depends upon a 

 psychical factor which has here grown into a physiological one, that is 

 to say, is just as much a matter of course, and appears quite as regularly 

 under given conditions as any other physiological result. Regarded 



