500 METABOLISM IN FASTING 



of fasting, with a loss in weight from the original seventeen 

 kilograms down to six kilograms; as experimental faults, 

 such as an occasional clandestine feeding by some compas- 

 sionate hand, can scarcely be entirely excluded in practice. 

 American authors have recently obtained information for 

 publication of a dog which withstood one hundred and seven- 

 teen days of hunger and a loss of sixty-three per cent, in 

 weight. 44 



When water is withdrawn at the same time hunger can- 

 not be withstood for nearly the same length of time. In this 

 case the water required for solution of the urea is abstracted 

 from the tissues. Straub observed in his thirsting dogs, fed 

 on dried meat and fat, a loss of one-fifth of the water con- 

 tained in the muscles ; yet in these cases the mode of feeding 

 could not be continued very long because of intestinal dis- 

 turbances and vomiting of the ingested food. According to 

 Eubner pigeons, die after four or five days if allowed to 

 hunger and thirst, but can be kept alive for twelve days if 

 given water. As a rule, fasting human beings do not drink 

 a great deal of water, as water is produced in the course of 

 combustion of the tissues and the amount of digestive juices 

 secreted is very small. 



Loss of Weight of the Organs. Death of animals in in- 

 anition occurs after at least from one-third to one-half of 

 their weight has been lost. If one considers, however, the 

 total amount of consumable material only, the loss at time of 

 death may amount to as much as seventy per cent. The loss 

 of weight in starved animals is distributed (as indicated by 

 the studies of Chossat, Voit, Kumagawa, Sedlmair and 

 others) unevenly; the adipose tissue being seriously in- 

 volved, a loss of ninety per cent, or more of this being pos- 

 sible. The muscles, the large glands and the blood may lose 

 as much as half their substance; while the central nervous 

 system remains almost unchanged in weight. The skeletal 



44 P. E. Howe, H. A. Matill and P. B. Hawk (Univ. of Illinois), Jour, of 

 Biol. Chem., 11, 103, 1912. 



