

EFFECTS OF EXCESS OF FOOD. 243 



the neuter bee, into which it would have otherwise been changed, not 

 only in the development of the reproductive system, but in the general 

 form of the body, the porportionate shortness of the wings, the shape 

 of the tongue, jaws, and sting, the absence of the hollows on the thighs in 

 which the pollen is carried, and the loss of the power of secreting wax. 



420. That insufficiency of wholesome food, continued through succes- 

 sive generations, may produce a marked effect, not merely upon the 

 stature, but upon the form and condition of the body, even in the 

 Human race, appears from many cases, in which such influence has 

 operated on an extensive scale. Thus there are parts of Ireland inha- 

 bited by a population descended from those who were treated by the 

 English as rebels two centuries since, and who were driven into moun- 

 tainous tracts, bordering on the sea, where they have been since exposed 

 to the two great brutalizers of the human race, hunger and ignorance. 

 The present race is distinguished physically from the kindred race of 

 Meath and other neighbouring districts, where the same causes have not 

 been in operation, by their low stature (not exceeding five feet two 

 inches), their pot-bellies and bow-legs ; whilst their open projecting 

 mouths-, with prominent teeth and exposed gums, their advancing cheek- 

 bones and depressed noses, bear barbarism in their very front. " These 

 spectres of a people that once were well-grown, able-bodied, and comely, 

 stalk abroad into the daylight of civilization, the annual apparitions of 

 Irish ugliness and Irish want." The aboriginal population of New 

 Holland, as a whole, presents a similar aspect ; and apparently from 

 the operation of the same causes. 



421. When a larger quantity of azotized food ( 429) is habitually 

 consumed than the wants of the system require, it is not converted into 

 solid flesh ; but it is got rid of by the various processes of excretion. 

 The increased production of Muscular fibre depends, as we have already 

 seen ( 362), upon nothing so much as the exercise of the muscle. It 

 cannot take place unless the blood supply it with the materials ; but no 

 degree of richness of the blood can alone produce it. Consequently, the 

 accumulation of nutritive matter in the blood is so far from being a con- 

 dition of health, that it powerfully tends to produce disease, either of 

 an inflammatory character, if the fibrine predominate, or of the he- 

 morrhagic character, if the red corpuscles predominate. This state is 

 most apt to present itself in those who live well and take little exercise ; 

 and the remedy for it is either to diminish the diet, or to increase the 

 amount of exercise, so as to bring the two into harmony. 



422. The continued over-supply of food has several injurious effects : 

 it disorders the digestive processes, by stimulating them to undue 

 activity, and lays the foundation for a complete derangement of them ; 

 it gives a predisposition to the various diseases of repletion, as already 

 noticed ; and it throws upon the excreting organs much more than their 

 proper amount of labour, besides tending to produce a depraved condi- 

 tion of the matters to be drawn off by them, which renders the proper 

 act of excretion still more difficult. When this is the case various disor- 

 ders arise, caused by the retention, within the circulating current, of 

 substances which are very noxious to the general system, and which 

 become most fertile sources of disease. What are commonly regarded 



