252 ELEMENTS OF PHYSIOLOGY 



a vegetarian diet ; it is also possible to do so in a temperate 

 climate, but it is hardly possible in the frigid zone. An 

 Eskimo will eat fifteen pounds of walrus fat in a day. 

 Too much meat in the diet affects students and sedentary 

 individuals more injuriously than it does muscle workers. 



456. Should the Diet be Bulky or Concentrated ? The 

 way this question is answered will determine whether 

 graham or white flour is better, whether the skins of beans 

 and peas and fruits should be removed, whether one should 

 eat coarse vegetables, such as cabbage, greens, celery. It 

 is probable that the true answer is that sedentary persons 

 with weak peristalsis of the stomach should not eat much 

 woody material as it causes the food to remain too long in 

 the stomach before it is reduced to chyme, while persons 

 whose business requires muscular activity and whose ali- 

 mentary canal possesses a more vigorous peristalsis, will 

 find a bulky food preferable. 



457. If, some hours after eating boiled cabbage, you 

 could still taste it, or another could detect the odor of it on 

 your breath, what inference might be drawn? If greens 

 were added to the usual dinner, and you had a feeling of 

 heaviness or dullness after dinner, what would you infer? 

 What would be the conclusion if you felt more vigorous 

 than usual? If you had fallen into the bad habit of 

 taking the feverish haste of business to the dinner table 

 with you, but on one day you " took things easy " at dinner, 

 as well-bred people should, eating very leisurely, and you 

 had a feeling of unusual lightness and energy in the 

 evening, what would you infer? 



458. Should a Person drink at Meals? Slow, careful 

 eaters, whose throats refuse to receive anything that is not 

 thoroughly chewed and mixed with saliva, should not drink 

 while eating, as it would dilute the digestive fluids already 

 abundant. But those who eat rapidly or do not chew 

 thoroughly, often find that some liquid at meals aids 



