FEEDING THE SICK. 3 
CHAPTER II. 
FPEEDING THE SICK. 
In the treatment of disease in the human family the present disposition of 
the most advanced physicians is largely to substitute food for medicine; and the 
same righteous tendency should exist among those who assume the care of dogs 
when ill. It cannot with truth be denied that many of the remedies in common 
use, even in recent years, have been of a nature more or less injurious to the 
organism, depressing and devitalizing it. The application of them has been in 
accordance with the Jesuit rule of doing a little evil that good may come. In 
the more modern practice, however, such chances have not been so freely taken, 
and the trend has been to do nothing but good to the patient. Hereafter the 
popular practice promises to be, to try to build up and keep up the sufferers 
from disease, and trust more to nature to effect a cure; while the classics and 
venerables, —as calomel, jalap, etc., — once counted by thousands, though pos- 
sibly used occasionally, will find but little favor. In other words, in the future 
when treating the sick, foods, not drugs, will be mainly relied upon. 
The kind of food needed for the sick is the most nutritious and easily diges- 
tible. Here it becomes necessary to digress for the purpose of contrasting 
briefly the digestive powers of man and the dog. In the former, digestion as a 
rule is much more rapid than in the latter. Consider, for instance, a moderate 
meal of fresh, uncooked meat. The average time required for digestion in the 
human stomach is from one hour to five hours, according to the kind of meat; 
pig’s feet occupying the shortest stated, and pork the longest. But for com- 
plete digestion, even of meat that is most easily disposed of, dogs require from 
nine to twelve hours. As regards the digestibility of the various meats, the 
same classification and order are alike applicable to both man and dog. Mani- 
festly a very large meal requires a somewhat longer time for digestion than a 
small one. Fat meat is harder to digest than the lean. With the skin, tendons 
or sinews, cartilage or gristle, and bones, dogs encounter the greatest difficulty 
in their attempts to dispose of them. The action of the stomach may be 
assisted or retarded by the forms in which meats are given. For instance, if 
they are in large pieces, it is much slower than it would be were they cut finely. 
A lean and tender meat that has been carefully minced, is digested more 
easily while in the raw state than it would be were it thoroughly cooked; but 
when not of that high quality, as a whole, meats are rendered more digestible 
