116 OF FOOD, AND THE DIGESTIVE PROCESS. 



posed and eliminated by the combustive process. Hence it may well be 

 conceived, that the effects of putrescent food would be much more decidedly 

 manifested amongst individuals dwelling in close, ill-ventilated apartments; 

 and although the same means ot comparison do not exist, since there is no 

 part of our town population habitually subsisting on such a diet as that of 

 the Faroese, yet there is no want of evidence with regard to the injurious 

 effects of even the occasional employment of putresceut food, especially 

 when any zymotic disease is epidemic. 1 



72. That it is Water which constitutes the natural drink of Man, and 

 that no other liquor can supply its place, is apparent from the most cursory 

 glance at its uses in the system ; and it is only necessary here to remark, 

 that the purity of the water habitually ingested is a point of extreme im- 

 portance. A very minute impregnation with lead, for example, is quite 

 sufficient to develop all the symptoms of chronic lead-poisoning, if the use 

 of such water be sufficiently prolonged. In the case of the ex-royal family 

 of France, many of whom suffered in this manner at Claremout, 2 the amount 

 of lead was only about one grain per gallon ; and in a case subsequently 

 published, in which also the symptoms of lead-poisoning were unequivocally 

 developed, the amount was no more than -g-th of a grain. 3 So again, an 

 excess of the saline ingredients which appear to be innocuous in small quan- 

 tities, may produce a marked disorder of the digestive organs, and (through 

 them) of the system generally. 4 Moreover, as in .the case of food, the pres- 

 ence of a very small amount of putrescent matter is quite sufficient to pro- 

 duce the most pernicious results, when that matter is habitually introduced 

 into the system ; and these results, on the one hand, manifest themselves in 

 the production of certain disorders which appear distinctly traceable to the 

 direct action of the poison so introduced; whilst, on the other, they become 

 apparent in the extraordinary augmentation of the liability to attacks of 

 such zymotic diseases as may at the time be prevalent. 5 The quantity of 

 water daily consumed is about four or five pounds; and a slight excess, in- 

 dicative of its formation in the system, is daily eliminated. The iugestion 

 of large quantities has been shown by Mosler 6 to cause a considerable in- 

 crease in the discharge of urea and salts in the urine, which appears to be 

 the result of an increased metamorphosis of the albuminous constituents of 

 the blood and tissues. The quantity of alcoholic liquids consumed in the 

 United Kingdom is extraordinarily great. A recent writer (Eev.W. Crane) 7 

 states that, in 1873, 28,908,501 gallons of home spirits; 10,223,709 gallons 



1 Facts of this kind have been abundantly furnished during the visitations of 

 Cholera. See the Eeport of the General Board of Health on the Epidemic' Cholera 

 of 1S48 and 1849, pp. 63, 04. An instance of a very remarkable kind occurred at 

 Bridgewaler, towards the close of that epidemic, as related to the Author by Dr. 

 Brittan. A cargo of spoiled oysters having been brought to the town, and the sale of 

 them having been prohibited on account of their putrescent condition, they were 

 given away to any who would receive them; and several children in a neighboring 

 school partook of them plentifully. In the course of the following night, all who 

 had eaten of the oysters (so far as Dr. Brittan could ascertain) were attacked with 

 cholera and choleraic diarrhoea, and eleven of the children died the next day. 



2 See the account of this case, which presents many features of great interest, in 

 the Dublin Quarterly Journal of Medical Science, vol. vii, p 415. 



;! See Herapatli in Medical Gazette, Sept. 20th, 18-30, p. 518. 



4 Of this a very instructive case, which occurred at \Volverton, has been published 

 by Mr. Corfc in the Pharmaceutical Journal, July, 1848. 



' Kor ample evidence to this ell'eet, see ]>r IVreira's Treatise on Food and Diet, 

 pp. S ( .i-91 ; and the Jleport, of the General Hoard of Health on the Epidemic Cholera 

 of 1N4S and 1859, pp. .V.l-i;:',, Appendix A, p. 14, and Appendix B, pp. 91-9o. 



6 Archiv des Vereins f. gemeins Arbeit., Bd. iii, 1857, p. 898. 



7 In a paper read before the Belfast Meeting of the Association for the Advance- 

 ment of Science, Aug. 2Cth, 1874. 



