EXTEACT OP MEAT. 
297 
as tlie meat-essence here spoken of. But this would be a 
totally false supposition. The tablets are made from the 
tendons and muscular fibre_, and contain much glue — gelatine 
— without any nourishment whatever. After a time_, a sick 
person fed on such preparation gets disgusted ; as was the 
case with the patients in the Hotel de Dieu at Paris. 
Moreover_, the jelly of which this mess is composed weakens 
the stomachy and deranges the organs of digestion. 
Now the use of pure meat-juice has just the contrary result. 
It is not only so agreeable to the taste^ that persons who have 
taken it in their invalid state continue to do so after perfect 
recovery but it appears to have a wonderfully restorative 
influence^ by assisting the digestive organs in their functions 
instead of oppressing or weakening them. It seems to act in 
the same way as the gastric juice — ^to help to digest food and 
cause its assimilation with the body. Indeed^ a French 
physician found the residue of gastric juice to be very analo- 
gous to pure essence of meat. He further tried to discover 
the cause of this power to further the assimilation of food ; 
but as there is a boundary beyond which it is vain for human 
investigation to go_, his efforts led to nothing. We know_, for 
example^ how meat may be produced^ and the various forms 
in wFich it is present ; but as to its innermost nature^ how it 
is that what is hot imparts warmth^ that is a secret which 
no analysis will explain or enable us to understand. 
It is not at all improbable that the similarity between meat- 
essence and its effects^ and gastric juice and its functions^ 
should produce that exhilarating restorative influence which 
the former invariably effects on the exhausted and suffering. 
The essence contains, too, phosphate in large quantities, 
and the same lactic acid which is secreted by the muscles in 
all bodily exertion. 
Following the method prescribed by Liebig, this extract 
has been prepared for some time at the Royal Pharmacy, 
Munich, under the superintendence of Professor Pettenkofer. 
But naturally it cannot be furnished at a less price than the 
selling price of meat in the country ; and it therefore is used 
— with but few exceptions — only by those who take it medi- 
cinally. From 128 lb. of beef four pounds of extract are 
prepared weekly, and dear as it is — two shillings an ounce — 
the demand for it is so great that the quantity made is always 
found insufficient. Even at this high price, high at least for 
Bavaria, many poor families for whom it was once prescribed 
continue to buy it ; not any longer as a restorative, but for 
use in the kitchen. 
For this latter purpose it will find many a purchaser if 
Herr Giebert succeeds, as he hopes to do, in his plan of 
