436 



CONSTIPATION 



CONSTITUTION 



or ' whole-meal ' bread, or gingerbread ; almost all 

 vegetables ( except potatoes ), either cooked or un- 

 cooked ; olive-oil, which may be used in salads ; 

 treacle, eaten with bread or made into puddings ; 

 fruit of all kinds, particularly prunes and figs, 

 which can be obtained all the year round all tend 

 to increase the activity of the bowels. If such 

 forms of food were more generally used, the rest 

 of the community would gain even more than the 

 many vendors of ' liver pills, ' and other quack 

 medicines would lose. 



The amount of fluid taken in the day is also 

 of importance. Many persons, especially those in 

 whom much fluid taken with meals interferes with 

 comfortable digestion, do not imbibe enough for 

 the needs of the body. In such cases a stated 

 amount of fluid should be taken at other times. A 

 tumbler of water, either cold or hot, slowly sipped 

 during the process of dressing in the morning, is 

 sometimes efficient in relieving constipation. 



Lastly, the use of medicinal remedies must be 

 shortly considered. Compared with the measures 

 already noticed, they must be regarded as an 

 evil, though often a necessary one. Constipation 

 may be seriously aggravated by their injudicious 

 employment. Often a large dose of some purgative 

 is taken and produces very free action of the bowels 

 with temporary relief ; but increased constipation 

 is almost sure to follow. The condition to be 

 remedied is a chronic and habitual one, and must 

 be combated by patient and persevering treatment. 

 The medicine selected should be taken every day, 

 but the dose must be the very smallest which will 

 produce the desired effect. 



It is impossible to enumerate all the drugs which 

 may be used, or to define the conditions in which 

 each is most likely to be beneficial. A few of those 

 in most general use only must be enumerated. 

 Natural mineral- waters (Friedrichshall, &c.) are in 

 much repute at present : a dose should be taken 

 on rising in the morning. Epsom or Glauber's salt, 

 if dissolved in plenty of water, is much cheaper and 

 almost as satisfactory. Effervescing salines (seid- 

 litz powder, magnesia, and many much-advertised 

 patent medicines) are more pleasant to take, and 

 have a similar action. Castor-oil in small doses at 

 bedtime is objectionable only on account of its 

 flavour. Compound colocynth pills, or colocynth 

 and hyoscyamus pills ; compound liquorice powder 

 (containing senna and sulphur, one of the best pre- 

 parations); Gregory's powder (containing rhubarb 

 and magnesia); podophyllin, euonymin, and other 

 drugs from America, are all useful aperients, and 

 should be taken at bedtime. Nux vomica is a 

 useful addition to other aperients, as it acts specially 

 upon the muscles of the intestines, increasing their 

 activity. A word of caution is necessary regarding 

 mercurial preparations, which are most valuable in 

 certain cases, but most dangerous if used habitually. 

 The indiscriminate use of calomel and gray powder 

 in the nursery, where they are very popular owing 

 to their tastelessness, cannot too strongly be con- 

 demned. The most generally useful of all aperients 

 at present in use is Cascara Sagrada, the bark of a 

 North American species of buckthorn (Rhamnus 

 Purshiana). The liquid extract is the preparation 

 in most general use, of which from 15 to 40 drops 

 taken daily, either in one dose at bedtime or still 

 better in several doses after meals, is generally 

 sufficient. It increases the secretions, but especially 

 the muscular power of the intestine ; and in very 

 many cases can be given up altogether after being 

 used for a few weeks (see also APERIENTS). In 

 some cases a Clyster ( q. v. ) is the most satisfactory 

 means of procuring an evacuation. 



Constipation in the lower animals depends, as in 

 man, on imperfect secretion from, or motion of, the 

 intestinal walls. In the horse it is usually accom- 



panied by Colic (q.v.), and when long continued 

 leads to Enteritis (q.v.). The appropriate remedies 

 are soap and water clysters given every two hours ; 

 smart friction and cloths wrung out of hot water 

 applied to the abdomen, with three drachms of 

 aloes and one of calomel given in gruel, and 

 repeated in sixteen hours, if no effect is produced. 

 Give, besides, walking exercise ; restrict the amount 

 of dry solid food, but allow plenty of thin gruel or 

 other fluids, which may be rendered more laxative 

 by admixture with treacle or a little salt. Similar 

 treatment is called for in dogs, cats, and pigs. 



In cattle and sheep, digestion principally takes 

 place in the large and quadrisected stomach ; the 

 bowels, accordingly, are little liable to derangement ; 

 and constipation, when occurring in these animals, 

 generally depends upon impaction of dry hard food 

 between the leaves of the third stomach, fardel-bag, 

 or moniplies. The complaint is hence called fardel- 

 bound. It results from the eating of tough and 

 indigestible food, such as ripe vetches, ryegrass, or 

 clover ; it prevails in dry seasons, and on pastures 

 where the herbage is coarse and the water scarce. 

 It occurs amongst cattle eating freely of hedge- 

 cuttings or shoots of trees, hence its synonym 

 wood-evil. From continuous cramming and want 

 of exercise, it is frequent in stall-feeding animals ; 

 whilst from the drying up of the natural secretions, 

 it accompanies most febrile and inflammatory dis- 

 eases. The milder cases constitute the ordinary 

 form of indigestion in ruminants, are accompanied 

 by what the cow-man terms loss of cud, and usually 

 yield to a dose of salts given with an ounce or two 

 of ginger. In more protracted cases, rumination is 

 suspended, appetite gone, constipation and fever 

 are present. There is a grunt noticeable, especially 

 when the animal is moved, different from that 

 accompanying chest complaints, by its occurrence 

 at the commencement of expiration. By pressing 

 the closed fist upwards and forwards beneath the 

 short ribs on the right side, the round, hard, dis- 

 tended stomach may be felt. This state of matters 

 may continue for ten days or a fortnight, when the 

 animal, if unrelieved, becomes nauseated, and sinks. 

 Stupor sometimes precedes death, whilst in some 

 seasons and localities most of the bad cases are 

 accompanied by excitement and frenzy. In this, 

 as in other respects, the disease closely corresponds 

 with stomach-staggers in the horse. 



Give purgatives in large doses, combining several 

 together, and administering them with stimulants 

 in plenty of fluid. For a medium-sized ox or cow, use 

 ID. each of common and Epsom salts, ten croton 

 beans, and a drachm of calomel, with three ounces 

 of turpentine ; and administer this in half a gallon 

 of water. If no effect is produced in twenty hours, 

 repeat the dose. Withhold all solid food ; encourage 

 the animal to drink gruel, sloppy mashes, treacle 

 and water ; and give exercise, clysters, and occa- 

 sional fomentations to the belly. 



Constitution* in Politics, signifies a system 

 of law established by the sovereign power of a 

 state for its own guidance. Its main objects are 

 to fix the limits and define the relations of the 

 legislative, the judicial, and the executive powers 

 of the state, both amongst themselves and with 

 reference to the citizens of the state, regarded as 

 a governed body. In continental countries, since 

 the formation of the federal government of the 

 United States of America, or, at all events, since 

 the first French Revolution, the idea of a constitu- 

 tion has been generally that of a body of written 

 public law, promulgated at once by the sovereign 

 power. In Great Britain it is the whole body of 

 the public law, consuetudinaiy as well as statutory, 

 which has grown up during the course of ages, and 

 is continually being modified by the action of the 

 general will as interpreted and expressed by the 



