86 DIGESTION AND RESORPTION 



of digestion is very nearly proportional to the 

 square root of the quantity of food. How well this 

 law agrees with reality is seen from a comparison 

 of the fifth and sixth columns, which latter is 

 calculated according to the said law. In practice 

 it is rather difficult to observe when the secretion 

 of juice is at an end. The square root regularity 

 might not be expected if the secretion of gastric 

 juice or, better, of pepsin and hydrochloric acid were 

 independent of the quantity of food. But if the 

 secretion during a given time increased nearly 

 proportionally to the square root of the quantity 

 of food itself, the said regularity would look natural. 

 That this condition is very nearly fulfilled we see 

 from the two last columns. The calculated figures 

 are proportional to the square root of the quantity 

 of food, and agree very well with the quantity of 

 gastric juice collected during the lapse of three 

 hours from the beginning of the secretion. We 

 must therefore conclude that the food in the mouth 

 and in the stomach acts upon the nerves of the 

 secreting glands in such a manner that their activity 

 is nearly proportional to the square root of the 

 quantity of food in question. The time for the 

 digestion of mixed food is in accordance with the 

 square-root rule calculated from the formula : 



where ^ is the time for the flesh, / 2 that for the 

 bread, and / 3 the time of digestion for the given 

 quantity of milk. 



