IIS 



FOOD, PRESERVATION UK. 



FORCE. 



with the best food, as the Hindoo with hu rice, or the South American 

 with hi* Indian corn or maixe." (Dr. Robert Dick/son : partly founded 

 on an article by Parent Duchatelct, 'Aliment,' in Dictionnaire de 

 1' Indiutrie.) 



An infringement of the laws deducible from these faota lead* to 

 serious (often fatal) consequence*. Englishmen going to India or other 

 hot countries, and continuing the habit* of their colder native clime, 

 instead of adopting the aimpler and more rational diet of the inha- 

 bitants, soon induce diseases of a formidable kind. Eating animal 

 food, frequently in excessive q\iantity, and drinking strong brandied 

 winen, Boon cause affections of the liver. (See 'A Treatise on the 

 Diseases of the Liver.' by tieorge Hamilton Bell, M.D., Intel; 

 Surgeon, Tanjore ; Edin., 1883, p. 17.) On the other hand, feeding 

 young children in the cold winters of England on rice to any extent, i 

 extremely injurious, leading especially to strumous diseases, particu- 

 larly of the eye. 



Where strengthening the body in the object, and bringing it up to 

 the highest point of health and vigour, a diminution of the fluids in 

 use, and avoiding as far as possible articles of a watery consistence, is 

 requisite. A very large proportion of all substances used as food con- 

 sists of water. Even lean beef has as much water in its composition 

 as the potato and plantain, that is, 78 per cent. While using such 

 articles at the principal meal, or dinner, it can scarcely ever be neces- 

 sary to use fluids or diluents at the same time ; yet most persons 

 begin that meal with soupe, some very maigre, and drench the stomach 

 with water, beer, and other liquids, scarcely any of which are proper, 

 save in a very restricted quantity. When liquids are useful, they may 

 be taken about four hours after the solid meal, whether tea or alkaline 

 drinks, such as soda water or Seltzer water. (See Prout ' On Diseases 

 of the Stomach.') [ALKALIES.] All the most skilful trainers of those 

 preparing for athletic feats rigidly enforce attention to this rule, inva- 

 riably putting those under their care on what is termed a dry diet. 

 Attention to this simple condition will often greatly improve the 

 health of valetudinarians. (See ' Pedestrianism,' by Walter Thorn, 

 with an ' Essay on Training,' by the celebrated Captain Barclay, Aber- 

 deen, 1813.) Not only is solid food digested more rapidly than liquid, 

 but the good effects are much more permanent. The practice long 

 indulged in of giving convalescents from acute diseases only weak broths 

 is now mostly abandoned. The articles selected as the basis of these 

 broths were also objectionable, being either veal, chicken, or other 

 insipid material, and the soup often made palatable by adding spices, 

 none of which are proper, save common salt. Young meats abounding 

 in gelatin are less digestible, less nourishing, and in every way less 

 proper than older meats. For persons recovering from what are 

 termed biliotu attacks, and paroxysms of gout, they are decidedly 

 hurtful. Besides, by long boiling gelatin undergoes a peculiar change 

 [QELATIS, in NAT. HIST. Div.], which further unfits it for use, perhaps 

 even engendering dangerous products. A well but not overdressed 

 mutton-chop, from which all the fat hat been removed before cool-ing, 

 in infinitely better. 



White fish, such as whitings, soles, and flounders are often fit for 

 convalescents, being neither too stimulating nor too nutritious, when 

 used without butter or rich sauces. Salt alone is proper. In some 

 hospitals, such as St. George's, London, a fish diet constitutes a 

 part of the diet-table. When jockeys at Newmarket wish rapidly to 

 reduce their weight, they are never allowed meat, when tish can be 

 obtained. (Paris, ' On Diet,' p. 223, 4th edition, 1829.) The oily and 

 red-fibred fish, such as herrings, eels, and salmon, are not so digestible, 

 though more nutritious. When patients in hospitals are permitted to 

 choose their own dinner, they almost invariably select stewed eels, an 

 indigestible food. The apparently highly nutritive power, not to say 

 curative, of cod-liver oil, has led to its very extensive use in the treat- 

 ment of strumous diseases, especially consumption. Fish, if allowed 

 to ferment or putrify, becomes very stimulating, owing to the disen- 

 gagement of ammonia. This renders it at first offensive to the sense of 

 smell in those unaccustomed to it. The Zetlanders term such fish 

 " blawn-fish." They are fit articles of food in cold regions, and are 

 used by the Esquimaux. Sir Edward Parry testified to their excellence 

 in this state. 



Mushrooms, of which 27 species, native of Great Britain, are escu- 

 lent, when properly prepared might be more extensively used as food, 

 I Kith by poor and rich, were their distinctive qualities better studied 

 and known. (See Dr. Badham on the ' Esculent Fungi of Great 

 Britain ;' and Mrs. Huasey's ' British Mycology.') 



FOOD, PRESERVATION OF. [AsTlsEirics.] 



FOOLS, FEAST OF. This was a festival anciently celebrated in 

 different churches and monasteries of Europe and the East, but most 

 perhaps in those of France upon New Year's Day, when every kind of 

 absurdity, and even indecency, was committed. It appears to have 

 been in fact a continuation of the heathen celebration of the January 

 Kalends. Mock popes, cardinals, and bishops, were elected, with 

 ludicrous dancing and singing, intended it is said to ridicule exploded 

 druidism. The council of Basel in 1435 expressed its detestation of 

 this and several other festivals which were then celebrated, and its 

 abolition, at least in one district, was ordered by an orret of the 

 parliament of Dijon in 1652. The reader who would know more of 

 this festival (may consult Du Cange's ' Glossary, r. KAI.EXD.X,' and 

 Du Tilliot's ' Memoires pour servir a 1'Histoire de la Fete des Foux, 



qui se faisoit autrefois dans plusieurs Eglises,' 4 to., l.nnn et a 

 Geneve, 1741. 



FOOT. [WEIGHTS ASD MEASURES.] 



FOOT-BALL, a ball made of a blown bladder cased with leather to 

 be kicked by the foot ; used by metonymy for the diversion of driving 

 the ball itself. This was an early and favourite sport with the 

 English. Fitzstephen mentions it among the games of the Londoners 

 in the time of Henry II. Pepys, in his ' Memoirs,' vol. i. p. 324, A.D. 

 1664-5, says, "January 2, to my Lord Brouncker's by ap|x>intn 

 the Piazza, Covent Garden : the street full of foot-balls, it 1 

 great frost," James I. forbade it to be practised near his court as 

 dangerous ; but Addison in the ' Spectator,' speaks of a " football 

 match," as one of the village sports patronised l>y Sir Hogcr de 

 Coverley. It is still a game much] practised by school-boys, ami in 

 many rural districts. At Derby it was played till a very rceen! ; 

 by opposing parishes, and not (infrequently attended with serious 

 accidents. 



l'i iKCE, a mechanical term, which though it be sufficiently under- 

 stood in its common and popular meaning, requires some consul' 

 before its strict and philosophical sense can be comprehended. 



The term force always implies the existence of some cause whi.-h 

 produces a visible mechanical effect. Thus the cause of motion and 

 the cause of pressure are both forces : again, difference of effects must 

 be attributed to difference in the producing causes : thus, greater or 

 less Telocity, and greater or less pressure, are both attributed t dif- 

 ferences in the causes of velocity or pressure. But on the other hand, 

 effects which are the same in one point of view may differ in another ; 

 thus, bodies of different weights, let fall from the same heights above 

 the ground, will strike the ground with the same velocities, but with 

 different degrees of effect upon the substance which they strike. 

 Again, if a ball be thrown upwards with a velocity a, which carries it 

 to a height ft, it will, when. thrown upwards with twice the velocity, 

 ascend through four times the height 6. Here, then^considered with 

 respect to one effect, the second force should seem to be twice the first : 

 considered with respect to another, the second seems four times the first. 

 Such difference of appearance in the numerical quantities of di 

 effects led at one time to long and warm disputes on the proper method 

 of measuring force, all of which a clearer knowledge of mechanics has 

 shown to be of very little use. One distinct meaning, with r.ire not 

 to assume the consequences of any other meaning as necessarily 

 deducible from the first, will enable the mechanical reasoner to esta- 

 blish the whole doctrine of ttatict, or equilibrium: another, tin- whole 

 doctrine of dynamic*, or motion. 



It should seem that these two (so called) force* should h.-n, .1 

 names ; but custom has settled otherwise. We proceed to the 

 definitions of force. 



In the theory of equilibrium, force is a synonym of prature, and 

 weight is its measure. The notion of force is here derived, most 

 probably, from the sensation which accompanies muscular effort. 

 Wherever pressure is produced we can find a weight which will supply 

 the place of the pressure : thus, if a string of indian-rubbcr, hanging 

 from a fixed point, be extended by the hand placed at its lower ex- 

 tremity until its length be doubled, we can, by suspending a weight at 

 the lower end, find what the weight must be in order to produce the 

 same effect. And we then say that the force which the hand exert* 

 is the same as that of the weight. The immediate causes of the 

 effect are very different : our own power of volition, and the connection 

 between the earth and the weight which it draws towards it are (\\<- 

 may safely say, with all our ignorance of causes) extremely < I 

 things; but where they produce the same effect, we cease to think 

 of the difference, and say that they both create the same furce or 

 preuure. 



In the preceding definition of force, time is not one of the elei 

 But we very soon observe that wherever pressure is produced motion 

 is prevented. Let the elastic string be suddenly cut in two. .-tud the 

 h.'.nd or the weight immediately descends. It is also pr,.i..! :!,,; 

 matter is incapable of producing either rest or motion in it-, -if: if :\ 

 certain rate of motion be communicated to it, it will prcscn 

 motion unaltered till some external cause interferes. On 

 the notion of force, as causing motion, depends for precision : the 

 alteration of velocity is the evidence of the existence of force. 



When force, in the sense of pressure, is considered as the cause 

 of motion, or rather of change of motion, we must take into account 

 both the necessity of introducing the element time, and also the ipi.n:- 

 tityof matter which is moved. No change of velocity c.,< 



Ui u-ly produced: if a billiard ball, moving 10 feet per second, l.e 



struck HO as to accelerate its motion to 20 feet per second. tli< 

 siin of velority is made gradually though rapidly. A stone which 

 has fallen for one second in a vacuum is, at the end of the 

 moving at the rate of 32 feet per second : let x bo any inn 

 fraction lees than 32, and there must bo a moment, during the course 

 of the second, at which the stone's velocity is x feet per second. 

 Again, when presmire produces motion, the velocity generated in a 

 given time in less, the greater the quantity of mutter to be moved. 

 Let different weights, the first double that of the second, be placed on 

 a table (friction not being supposed to exist) and let given equal 

 weights (say each one ounce) be attached to them by strings and 

 hang over the side of the table : then, supposing the two first weight- 



