DIGESTION 181 



passes out of the stomach, a sharp line of demarcation distin- 

 guishing it from its neighbour. If the stomach be empty or 

 greatly contracted, the first food to arrive is lodged in the lesser 

 curvature and pylorus ; gradually, as new material arrives, this 

 passes over to the greater curvature in order to make room for 

 it. If a horse be fed first with hay, followed by oats, the presence 

 of the oats causes the hay to pass out more rapidly than it 

 would have done had it been given alone. 



Ellenberger has shown that when hay and oats are given in 

 the order named, a portion of the oats may pass into the bowel 

 by the lesser curvature without entering either the left sac or 

 fundus of the stomach (see Fig. 66, 1.). When oats followed by 

 hay are given, the oats, as the first arrival, naturally commence 

 to pass out first, but the presence of the hay hurries the rate of 

 progress, and the oats pass more quickly into the intestines 

 than they otherwise would have done. The regular arrangement 

 of food in layers is disturbed when a horse is watered after 

 feeding ; half the food may in this way be washed out of the 

 stomach, for the water which a horse drinks does not stop in 

 the stomach, but passes directly through it on its way to the 

 caecum. Hence we have the golden rule of experience that 

 horses should be watered first and fed afterwards. 



These facts may be summarised by saying that in a succession 

 of foods the first consumed is the first to pass out. That does 

 not mean to say that the whole of it passes out before any 

 portion of the succeeding food enters the bowel, for we have 

 shown that after a time, at the pylorus, they mix and pass out 

 together ; but the actual influence of giving a food first is to 

 cause it to pass out first. The practical application of this fact, 

 according to Ellenberger, is that when foods are given in succes- 

 sion, the least albuminous should be given first. This appears 

 distinctly to reverse the English practice of giving oats first and 

 hay afterwards, but perhaps only apparently so, for experiment 

 shows that the longer digestion is prolonged, the more oats and 

 the less hay pass out, so that some hay (under ordinary circum- 

 stances a moderate quantity) is always left in the stomach until 

 the commencement of the next meal. The presence of this hay 

 from the previous feed may prevent the corn of the succeeding 

 meal from passing out too early. According to Ellenberger, in 

 order that horses may obtain the fullest possible nutriment from 

 their oats, hay should be given first, and then water ; this carries 

 some of the hay into the bowel, and after a time the oats are 

 to be given. The remaining hay now passes into the bowel, 

 and the oats remain in the stomach. This does not accord with 

 English views of watering and feeding fast-working horses, 

 views which have stood the test of prolonged practical experience. 



