FOOD ACCESSORIES AND DIGESTION. 69 



cent infusion of tea. Further researches appeared to show that this 

 retarding effect of beef -tea was due to the salts of the organic acids 

 contained in it. 



While on the subject of beef -tea, it will be novel and instructive 

 to many to hear that 



there is a wide-spread misapprehension among the public in regard to the nutri- 

 tive value of beef-tea. The notion prevails that the nourishing qualities of the 

 meat pass into the decoction, and that the dry, hard remnant of meat-fiber which 

 remains undissolved is exhausted of its nutritive properties ; and this latter is 

 often thrown a way as useless. A deplorable amount of waste arises from the 

 prevalence of this erroneous notion. The proteid matter of meat is quite insolu- 

 ble in boiling water, or in water heated above 160 Fahr. The ingredients that 

 pass into solution are the sapid extractives and salines of the meat, and nothing 

 more except some trifling amount of gelatine. The meat remnant, on the other 

 hand, contains the real nutriment of the meat, and if this be beaten to a paste 

 with a spoon or pounded in a mortar and duly flavored with salt and other con- 

 diments, it constitutes not only a highly nourishing and agreeable but also an 

 exceedingly digestible form of food.* 



Beef -tea must therefore be looked upon rather as a stimulant and 

 restorative than as a nutrient beverage, but it is nevertheless very valu- 

 able on account of those properties. 



Sir W. Roberts puts forward an ingenious argument, which can not 

 be fully repeated here, in favor of the view that, in healthy and strong 

 persons, this retarding effect on digestion observed to be produced by 

 many of the most commonly consumed food accessories answers a dis- 

 tinctly useful end. They serve, he maintains, the purpose of whole- 

 somely slowing the otherwise too rapid digestion and absorption of 

 copious meals. 



A too rapid digestion and absorption of food may be compared to feeding a 

 fire with straw instead of with slower-burning coal. In the former case it would 

 be necessary to feed often and often, and the process would be wasteful of the 

 fuel ; for the short-lived blaze would carry most of the heat up the chimney. To 

 burn fuel economically, and to utilize the heat to the utmost, the fire must be 

 damped down, so as to insure slow as well as complete combustion. So with 

 human digestion : our highly prepared and highly cooked food requires, in the 

 healthy and vigorous, that the digestive fires should be damped down, in order 

 to insure the economical use of food. . . . "We render food by preparation as 

 capable as possible of being completely exhausted of its nutrient properties; and, 

 on the other hand, to prevent this nutrient matter from being wastefully hurried 

 through the body, we make use of agents which abate the speed of digestion. 



It must be borne in mind that these remarks apply only to those 

 who possess a healthy and active digestion. To the feeble and dys- 

 peptic any food accessory which adds to the labor and prolongs the 

 time of digestion must be prejudicial ; and it is a matter of com- 



* " These remarks on beef -tea apply equally to Liebig's extract of meat, Brand's es- 

 sence of beef, and Valentine's me at- juice, all of which are devoid of albuminous constitu- 

 ents " ("British Medical Journal," August, 1885). 



