286 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 
EXPERIMENTS IN ABSTINENCE FROM FLUIDS. 
PROF. E. T. NELSON, OHIO WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY. 
Dr. Tanner has well-earned the title of the ‘‘ Fast-Male,” by his remarkable 
experiment and its successful termination. As illustrating the power of the will 
over the physical nature of man, the experiment is the most important ever re- 
corded. The Doctor seems to have gained nourishment as well as consolation 
from a sip of ice water. 
The details of an experiment of an exactly opposite character may not be 
without interest. In 1878 Mr. Charles King, a student of this university, had 
his attention called to the subject of water as an article of diet and to the writings 
of our leading physiologists on this subject. He found Dalton saying, ‘* Water 
is probably the most important substance to be supplied with constancy and reg- 
ularity, and the system suffers more rapidly when entirely deprived of fluids than 
when the supply of solid food only is withdrawn.” 
Flint claims, ‘‘ the body only requires not less than three pints of water to 
two and a half pounds of meat, bread and other solid food daily~” 
Mr. King resolved to avoid the use of all fluids in his diet in order to test 
the effect upon his system. The experiment began on the first day of September. 
The weather was very warm and sultry. ‘The diet consisted of bread with a 
little butter, meat and potatoes, but no tea, coffee, milk, water, gravy or other 
fluid. His appetite, only moderate at first, increased regularly during the whole 
time of the experiment. His pulse was low but very regular, and the general 
tone of the system good. At the end of thirty days he gave up the investigation 
because informed by his friends and physicians that it must prove injurious. 
During the first week in October he drank very moderately of water, consuming 
during the seven days exactly one quart. He then resumed his experiment for 
another thirty days, only under a more complete supervision of his diet, so as to 
avoid the use of any article that contained much water. During this month he 
took no fruit, nor vegetables of any kind except potatoes. No special change in 
his symptoms or feelings was observed during the second experiment. After — 
the first few days all sensation of thirst disappeared, and as Mr. King expressed 
it, ‘¢ I never felt better in my life.” 
During the whole period of two months he took much exercise and was a 
close faithful student. It should be stated that just before entering upon these 
investigations Mr. King had used milk and water very freely, perhaps to the 
extent of two quarts per day. 
August 7, 1880. 
