THE LUCKY DOG. 81) 



learniuj^ stereotyped theories by heart. But there has iii all 

 ages been a remarkable tendency, esj)ecially amonj^st legally 

 qualified medical practitioners, to o\erlook the very simple but 

 all important fact, that the food for each kind of animal 

 must not only suit it chemically, but mechanically : or in other 

 words that its bulk and its textm-e ai-e often of far more 

 importance than its chemical constituents. 



72. — When the great French physiologist, Francois M.agendie, 

 found that the dog could not live on sugar, butter, oil, jellies, 

 or fine flour, he at once jumped to the conclusion that it must 

 be because these substances were deficient of some recjuired 

 chemical constituent, and decided that it was the want of nitrogen 

 or azote in such food. That nonsense has been repeated up to 

 the present day, and even the Encyclopaedia Britanica gravely 

 tells us that Magendie "discovered that food destitute of 

 nitrogen is not nutritious." But some boy who did not know 

 the meaning of nitrogen or azote, had the common sense to 

 suspect that his dog would get on all right with the sugar or the 

 butter if it was mixed with some substance that would carry it 

 into and out of his bowels, and when he fed him on sweetened 

 and buttered sawdust his dog became the admired and envied of 

 all other dogs, though none of all these learned men quoted the 

 boy as an authority on the subject. 



Thousands of patients are annually killed and millions are 

 made miserable by following their doctor's advice to take 

 substances that contain a large proportion of nourishment 

 instead of such natural food as will readily yield up what little 

 nourishment it contains, and pleasantly pass the machinery for 

 extracting it. 



73. — For all ordinary purposes, however hard or fast a horse 

 has to work, his maize, oats, or barley, should be mixed with an 

 equal weight, or with twice their 1)ulk of chaff (cut hay or straw). 

 If beans, peas, or wheat are used more chaff must be mixed s\'ith 

 them, because they contain less husk in themselves. If the 

 work required is very light the corn should be reduced in 

 proportion, or the horses may be fed entirely on hay and grass, 

 or on hay and roots. A good deal of slow work may be done 



