-4 



56 PHYSIOLOGY ANIX HEALTH. 



digestive organs and the blood-vessels becomes exhausted 

 during the night, and the system needs more food before 

 any considerable amount of action is undertaken in the 

 morning; for the frame is not then prepared to bear any 

 more drafts, and it must be recruited before it can undergo 

 any severe labor. The breakfast should therefore be taken 

 soon, within an hour after rising. This is especially requi- 

 site for invalids, who have not much strength, and but little 

 power of endurance. 



112. When the morning meal is not to be eaten early, 

 some light refreshment at the time of rising will meet the 

 immediate wants of the system, and sustain it during the 

 morning exercise. It is well, then, if some considerable 

 time is to elapse between rising and breakfast, to take some 

 food early. This is a common custom among the Creoles 

 of Louisiana and the inhabitants of Cuba, and some classes 

 of people in France. These have coffee, fruit, or other light 

 food sent to their sleeping-rooms, sometimes before, and 

 sometimes after rising, which, they think, enables them the 

 better to sustain any fatigue before the regular breakfast is 

 given them. 



113. The animal system sustains all action, labor, and 

 exposure best when it is well nourished. When the nutri- 

 ment fails, it becomes sooner fatigued, and more susceptible 

 of pain; and, besides this, it is more liable to suffer from 

 any causes, which would impair its soundness or diminish 

 its vitality. The contagion of disease, the infection of fever, 

 whatever may bring on disorder, act more readily and pow- 

 erfully on the hungry, and on those who are badly nourished, 

 than on those who are well fed. We are better able to resist 

 the influence of cold, and to maintain the natural temperature 

 of the body, when we are full, than when we are fasting. 



114. All these causes of disorder or suffering act upon 

 the human constitution with more destructive force before 

 breakfast than afterward. On this account, all who are 

 about to expose themselves to any of these morbid influ- 

 ences, to contagion or infection of disease, or to such 



