686 GENERAL REVIEW OF THE NUTRITIVE PROCESSES. 



about the room and took food when it was presented to them ; and, if the ar- 

 tificial assistance was sufficiently prolonged, and they were not again subjected 

 to the starving process, most of them recovered. If they were left to them- 

 selves too early, however, the digestive process was not performed, and they 

 ultimately died. Up to the time when they began to take food, their weight 

 continued to diminish ; the secretions being renewed, under the influence of 

 artificial heat, sometimes to a considerable amount. It was not until Diges- 

 tion had actually taken place (which, owing to the weakened functional power, 

 was commonly many hours subsequently to the ingestion of the food), that 

 the animal regained its power of generating heat ; so that, if the external 

 source of heat was withdrawn, the body at once cooled : and it was not until 

 the quantity of food actually digested was sufficient to support the wants of 

 the body, that its independent power of Calorification returned. It is to be 

 remembered that, in such cases, the resources of the body are on the point of 

 being completely exhausted, when the attempt at re-animation is made ; con- 

 sequently it has nothing whatever to fall back upon ; and the leaving it to itself 

 at any time until fresh resources have been provided for it, is consequently 

 as certain a cause of death, as it would have been in the first instance. It 

 can scarcely be questioned, from the similarity of the phenomena, that Inani- 

 tion, with its consequent depression of temperature, is the immediate cause 

 of death in various Diseases of Exhaustion; and it seems probable that there 

 are many cases, in which the depressing cause is of -a temporary nature, and 

 in which a judicious and timely application of artificial Heat might prolong 

 life until it has passed off, just as artificial Respiration is serviceable in cases 

 of Narcotic Poisoning ( 885). It is especially, perhaps, in those forms of 

 Febrile disease, in which no decided lesion can be discovered after death, that 

 this view has the strongest claim to reception ; but many other cases will 

 occur to the intelligent Practitioner.* 



897. Having thus considered the means, by which the degree of Heat ne- 

 cessary for the performance of the functions of the Human system is gene- 

 rated, we have to inquire how its temperature is prevented from being raised 

 too high ; in other words, what Frigorifying means there are, to counter- 

 balance the influence of causes, which in excess would otherwise be fatal, by 

 raising the heat of the body to an undue degree. How is it, for example, 

 that, when a person enters a room whose atmosphere is heated to one or 

 two hundred degrees above his body, the latter does not partake of the eleva- 

 tion, even though exposed to the heat for some time ? Or, since the inhabitants 

 of a climate where the thermometer averages 100 for many weeks together, 

 are continually generating additional heat in their own bodies, how is it that 

 this does not accumulate, and raise them to an undue elevation ? The means 

 provided by Nature for cooling the body when necessary, are of the simplest 

 possible character. From the whole of its soft moist surface, simple Evapo- 

 ration will take place at all times, as from an inorganic body in the same cir- 

 cumstances ; and the amount of this will be regulated merely by the condi- 

 tion of the atmosphere as to' warmth and dryness. The more readily watery 

 vapour can be dissolved in atmospheric air, the more will be lost from the 



* The beneficial result of the administnition of Alcohol in such conditions, and the large 

 amount in which it may be given with impunity, may probably be accounted for on this 

 principle. That ii i< a ^p'viiie stimulus to the Nervous system, cannot be doubted from its 

 eil'eets on the healthy body; but that it serves as a fuel to keep up the Calorifying process, 

 appears equally certain. Now its ^ivat ellieaey in such cases seems to depend upon the 

 readiness \vith which it will be taken into the Circulation, by a simple act of Endosmotic 

 Imbibition, when the special Absorbent process dependent upon the peculiar powers of the 

 cells of the villi ( 181), is in abeyance. There is no other combustible fluid, whose density, 

 relatively to that of the Blood, will permit of its rapid Absorption by the simple physical 

 process adverted to. 



