

HUMAN FAT NUTRITIVE EQUIVALENTS. 161 



prevent catching cold." It is therefore temporarily used in cases of 

 extreme exhaustion from exertion and want of food; but a reaction 

 ensues, and its ultimate effects are disastrous. It is apparent that 

 people of cold climates take more spirits than those of warm climates, 

 with less injury; for, us Liebig says, they inhale a more condensed 

 air, take in more oxygen by inspiration, combustion is more rapid, and 

 the alcohol is thereby more readily thrown off. Before it gets to the 

 lunus, however, it exerts a pernicious influence in the circulation on 

 the brain, liver, &c., and there are other and much more salutary com- 

 bustibles fur the support of animal heat. It does not form fat, as its 

 carbon (79) and hydrogen (19-74) are not in the proportion of these 

 elements in fat; nor do we commonly find drunkards fat. 



When the non-nitrogenized food, such as sugar, starch, gum, fat, 

 &c. are disproportionate to the quantity of oxygen taken into the lungs 

 by inspiration, the excess forms fat. These contain about 79 carbon 

 to aboiu 11 hydrogen. Tne conversion of starch and sugar into fat 

 is illustrated by the fact that a goose weighing 4 pounds gained in 36 

 days, by bemsj fed on 24 pounds of Indian corn, 5 pounds, and yielded 

 85 pounds of fat. Fat is evidently converted into most of the princi- 

 ples necessary for the prolongation of animal life, as seen by the ab- 

 sorption of that of the body. The use of fat is evidently as a reservoir 

 of nutriment; for, in the absence of the required food, it is taken up 

 and consumed. It yields carbon and hydrogen for burning in the 

 lungs for the promotion of heat, but it does not renovate. Indian 

 corn contains 9 per cent, of a yellow oil, and a bushel yields 2 pounds. 

 Hay contains 2 per cent, of fatty matter. Milch cows have less 

 fit than the food they have consumed, because it goes to the milk. 

 The food richest in starch, sugar, &c. contributes most to fat in ani- 

 mals. Human fat is composed of carbon 79, hydrogen 11, and oxygen 

 9 percent. Turkish women, it is said, by tueir diet of rice and strong 

 soups, unite the conditions for the formation of cellular tissue and 

 fat; and in the Bey's seraglio they are fattened against a certain day 

 by repose, baths, and a diet of Turkish flour with honey- This is ac- 

 complished in 15 days. 



A scale of nutritive equivalents of the most important vegetable food 

 has been formed on the proportion of the nitrogen they contain, which 

 is as follows : 



Substances. Equirts. Substances. EquivU. 



Wheat . . 107 



Do. Flour, . . 100 



Barley Meal, . 119 



Barley, . . .130 



Indian Corn, . . 138 



Rice, -. . .117 

 14* 



Buckwheat, . . 108 



Potatoes, . . 613 



Do. kept 10 months, . 894 



Do. died at 212, . 126 



Lentils, . . .57 



Turnips, . , 133b 



