ASTIMAL FOOD. 275 



Good Meat Good meat has the following character- 

 istics : 



1. It is neither of a pale-pink color nor of a deep-purple tint, 

 for the former is a sign of disease and the latter indicates that the 

 animal had not been slaughtered but had died with the blood in it 

 or had suffered from acute fever; 



2. It has a marbled appearance, from the ramifications of 

 little veins of fat among the muscles ; 



3. It should be firm and elastic to the touch and should 

 scarcely moisten the fingers bad meat being wet and sodden and 

 flabby, with the fat looking like jelly or wet parchment ; 



4. It should have little or no odor and the odor should not be 

 disagreeable, for diseased meat has a sickly, cadaverous smell and 

 sometimes a smell of physic. This is very apparent when the meat 

 is chopped up and drenched with warm water; 



5. It should not run to water nor become very wet on stand- 

 ing for a day or so, but should, on the contrary, dry upon the sur- 

 face; 



6. When dried at a temperature of 112 or thereabout, it 

 should not lose more than from seventy to seventy-four per cent, of 

 its weight; whereas bad meat will often lose as much as eighty per 

 cent; 



7. It should not shrink or waste much in cooking. 



SALTED MEAT is objectionable on several grounds. Its common 

 use when fresh meat can be obtained is therefore undesirable, and 

 it is unsuitable for invalids. It is deficient in nutritive value and 

 natural flavor, from the extraction of a considerable quantity of the 

 juices of the meat. It is deficient in tenderness and therefore to 

 some extent insoluble by the digestive secretions. It also acts 

 prejudicially on the system by the introduction of an excessive 

 quantity of salt and saltpetre. 



BEEF and MUTTON are the principal fresh meats. The former 

 is of a firmer and closer texture than the latter, contains more red- 

 blood juices, has a fuller and richer flavor, containing more iron, is 

 more satisfying and more strengthening and makes greater demands 

 upon the digestive powers. Yet it is a common article, not only at 

 the ordinary dinner table, but even in the sick-room. In many 

 cases of illness, if properly cooked, it may be eaten with impunity; 

 but in typhoid fever and other diseases where the bowels are 

 inflamed and tender, it produces, in its ordinary form, injurious 

 effects. Even beef-ea often increases the irritation, keeps up the 

 fever and aggravates the diarrhea; consequently in such cases it 

 should, for the most part, be excluded from the diet list. As beef 

 requires considerable effort on the part of the stomach to convert it 

 into chyme, it is contra-indicated in acute maladies until convales- 

 cence has commenced, when by allowing the patient to extract the 

 juice at first, and then swallow a few shreds of the meat, daily 

 increasing the amount swallowed, the digestive organs will be fin- 



