OF FOOD AND HUNGER. 209 



Others take only sea-water. 



Innumerable similar facts clearly prove man to be 

 omnivorous. 



NOTES. 



(A) If hunger arise from merely a sense of vacuity in the 

 stomach, why should it be increased by the application of cold 

 to the surface, ^the deglutition of cold liquids, &c.? 



The explanation by friction of the nigte is equally unsatisfac- 

 tory , because the friction of these, if it does really occur, can- 

 not be greater than the friction-of the -stomach against its contents 

 immediately after a meal, at which time hunger does not exist. 



Nor can the presence of the gastric juice explain the matter; 

 because, as every one knows, no mental sensation arises in any 

 other organ that is not excrementory, from the peculiar stimulus 

 of its natural fluid - and I presume that this is the stimulus 

 alluded to, because the mechanical stimulus from the bulk of the 

 gastric juice, occurs equally from the presence of food, which, 

 does not excite hunger. 



The supposition of an acrimony generated in the gastric 

 juice, &c. being a cause of hunger, is absurd ; the fluid would be 

 unfit for its purposes, and would be more likely to destroy than 

 produce appetite. 



Hunger has been attributed by some to a sympathy of the 

 stomach with a general feeling of want in the system. But 

 hunger is removed immediately that a due quantity of food is 

 swallowed, long before the general system can have derived 

 benefit from the meal ; fowls are satisfied when their crops are 

 filled, although their food is not even ground, preparatorily to 

 digestion, till it has passed from the crop into the gizzard, and 

 ruminating animals leave off eating before they begin to chew 

 what they have distended their stomachs with. The circum- 



P 



