Comments on Corpulency. ^79 



the narrative. The next is the importance attached to brown 

 bread, or bread having a certain quantity of bran in it, — a very 

 grand secret in the history of panification, from its practical 

 application to medical purposes, the whole of the alimentary 

 secretions being altered by a change in the quality of the bread, 

 as I know of my own experience, by occasionally dining with 

 some of the advocates of this hruno-nian system. 



To observe that just medium, with respect to quantity, which 

 is most conducive to a healthy state of stomach, demands not 

 only attention, but resolution. The how much must be deter- 

 mined by~the individual ; those who can abstain at the first 

 sensation of satiety, and can resist the demands of appetite, 

 have made great progress in the art of curing most chronic 

 indispositions, of regaining health, and preserving it. 



Unerring Nature learn to follow close. 

 For quantum sujfficit is her just dose. 



This, though a trite and familiar doctrine, cannot be too 

 strongly or too often inculcated ; in fact, " non satiari cibis'* 

 is a rule of health as old as Hippocrates. 



Case VII. — From a Country Physician, 



** Nothing proves you more to be a man of business than your 

 nand-writing, which is as illegible as Sir Walter's. In this re- 

 spect I am myself on a par with the most learned doctors of 

 our acquaintance, as you will readily admit before you have 



read three lines of this journal Our fat patient fasts 



and grumbles, but keeps up his weight in a wonderful degree* 

 * C'est un personnage illustre dans son genre, et qui a port^ le 

 talent de se bien nourrir, jusqu'o^ il pouvait aller ; il ne sem- 

 ble n6 que pour la digestion.' I believe he would fatten on 

 sawdust. There is one very important improvement in his 

 symptoms. He can breathe better, and can lie in a recum- 

 bent posture, which he has not been able to do for many years. 

 This alone keeps him to his ' regime forte et dure,' — for it is 

 a curious circumstance, that after three months' starvation, as 

 he calls it, he is not above ten pounds lighter in weight, though 

 he is wonderfully lighter in his feelings. Every time I see him 

 I have to contend with some cogent reason, which he urges 

 with considerable humour, to prove that his constitution will 



