160 GOOD HEALTH 



Now Dr. Beaumont was a physician who lived in the 

 town where the shooting accident happened. He was 

 acquainted with Alexis St. Martin, and as he was anxious 

 to know just how the stomach works when it is trying 

 to digest food, he invited the young man to come and 

 live in his house and let him keep watch of his eating. 



I suppose this was the first time in the history of the 

 world that a doctor had had a chance to look into the 

 stomach of a live man whenever he wished to see what 

 was going on there. Dr. Beaumont was able to do this 

 for several years, because St. Martin stayed with him a 

 long time. 



Fortunately for everybody the man was healthy and 

 enjoyed eating; he chewed and swallowed, and drank 

 water or milk or whisky just as Dr. Beaumont advised. 

 In fact he seemed to be willing to eat anything the doc- 

 tor gave him, and to eat much or little according as 

 Dr. Beaumont wished to make his experiments, and so it 

 came about that on certain days he ate one thing at a 

 meal, while on other days he ate several different kinds 

 of things at a meal. 



As these experiments went on day after day, nothing 

 that the young man ate or drank escaped Dr. Beaumont's 

 eyes. He watched the food digest after each meal, and 

 found out precisely how long it took St. Martin's stomach 

 to get anything ready to go on into the next part of the 

 long food tube. He also learned what kinds are the 



