LEGUMINOUS KOOTS, LEAVES, SEEDS, ETC. 97 



probably due to a deficiency in variety of alimentary prin- 

 ciples is shown by Magendie's experiments on dogs : 



" A dog eating ad libitum of white bread, made of pure 

 wheat, and drinking at will ordinary water, does not live be- 

 yond fifty days ; he dies at the end of that time, with all the 

 signs of gradual exhaustion above noted. 



" A dog eating exclusively of military brown bread (de 

 'munition) lives very well, and the health is not altered in 

 any way." ] 



Brown bread is not perhaps absolutely so nutritive as 

 white ; but as it contains a certain quantity of the bran, it 

 presents a greater variety of nutritive principles, and seems, 

 from the above experiments, better calculated, as the single 

 article of food, to meet the demands of the system. 



The paste, which in Italy takes the place, to a great ex- 

 tent, of bread, in the form of macaroni, vermicelli, etc., is a 

 highly nutritious preparation. The real Italian article is 

 made of the hard wheat with only the outer covering re- 

 moved, and contains a much greater proportion of gluten 

 and oily matters than ordinary bread. It is made to assume 

 its peculiar form by forcing the thick paste through per- 

 forated metallic plates. It is then dried and may be kept for 

 any length of time. Presenting, as it does, a larger propor- 

 tion of nitrogenized and fatty matters, it is more nutritious 

 than bread. Payen estimates the nutritive value of 100 parts 

 as equal to 151'5 parts of white bread. 3 



Leguminous Roots, Leaves, Seeds, etc. 



The remaining vegetable articles of food do not demand 

 extended consideration, as the alimentary principles which 

 they contain are little different from those already de- 

 scribed. They are highly useful, however, as furnishing that 

 variety of diet, the necessity of which cannot be too fully in- 



1 MAGENDIE, Precis jZlemeniaire de Physiologic, Paris, 1836, tome Si., p. 504. 

 3 Op. cit., p. 294. 



