Miscellanies. 20 i 



of the stomach, which was found, upon repeated trials, to be 100° 

 Farenheit. The only difference between natural and artificial diges- 

 tion was a difference in the time of its accomplishment, the latter re- 

 quiring from twice to three times the length of the former* This is 

 satisfactorily explained, by the difficulty of maintaining the articles 

 at the exact natural temperature and by the impossibility of imita- 

 ting perfectly the motions of the stomach. No similar change took 

 place when food was exposed, under the same circumstances, to the 

 action of the saliva. 



4. To the formation of chyme it is only necessary that animal 

 or vegetable substances, be exposed to the action of healthy gas- 

 tric juice, at the ordinary temperature of the body. Mastication, 

 insalivation and deglutition, although they facilitate and render it more 

 speedy, are not essential to the process. The vital action of the 

 stomach, which by many has been believed to be directly operative 

 in the conversion of food into chyme, is shewn to be so only in an 

 indirect manner. Its vital powers are exerted in two ways : first, 

 in furnishing the gastric juice, and secondly in the conversion of fluid 

 alimentary substances into solid, either by their coagulation,* if they 

 are susceptible of this change, as is the case with milk ; or by the 

 absorption of their fluid parts if they are not, as when animal broths 



are introduced into the stomach. 



We have enumerated but a few of the facts and principles which 

 are either established or elucidated by the experiments of Dr. Beau- 

 mont. There are especially many facts, of general interest in rela- 

 tion to the different digestibility of different articles commonly used 

 for food, which must be passed over for want of space. The follow- 

 ing instances will serve to show how great the difference is in point 

 of time, between some of the more common articles. The ordi- 

 nary time occupied in the complete digestion of a full meal, of a 

 mixture of the common articles of food, is from three to three and a 

 half hours. When the stomach is diseased, or disturbed by narcotics; 

 when the mind is agitated by anger or any other strong emotion ; or 

 when the food is in large masses, a longer time is required ; and a 

 shorter, when the food has been minutely divided and mingled with 

 saliva, or when the temperature of the stomach, in common with the 

 rest of the body, has been elevated by moderate exercise. Of the 



1 This is more probably the effect of the gastric juice than of the stonuch itst-lL 



Vol. XXVL— No. 1. 26 



