80 
Dr. Beale, on Nutrition, 
creased or diminished nutritition of the body, we refer really 
to an increase or diminution of the adipose tissue, and, hut 
to a less extent, of the muscular tissue. At the same time we 
know that every tissue in the body is nourished from the 
earliest period of its existence ; but of all the tissues when 
the organism is fully developed the adipose and muscular are 
most influenced by altered diet. It may be said that the 
elementary parts of these tissues exhibit greater variation in 
activity than those of other textures. In some men and ani- 
mals it would appear that the elementary parts of adipose 
tissue take up in proportion a larger share of nutrient matter 
than those of other tissues ; while, on the other hand, the 
elementary parts of the glandular excretory organs are, in 
other individuals, the most active. The elements which in 
the first would become an integral part of the body, as fat 
and other tissues, would in the last escape as carbonic acid, 
water, and other substances, in the excretions. It is not 
possible to say why one set of tissues should be most active 
in one individual, and another set in another individual, any 
more than we can explain why a particular kind of food, 
which is most easily assimilated by one person or animal, 
would be useless or injurious to another. 
As there are in the body many different tissues to be nou- 
rished, and many different substances in the blood which 
may nourish them, it is necessary to consider what particular 
constituents of the blood are principally concerned in the 
nutrition of the different textures. The opinion seems to 
have been very generally entertained that certain substances 
in the blood were destined for the nutrition of particular 
tissues, while other textures selected from the fluid consti- 
tuents are of a different character ; for instance, it has been 
supposed that the red blood-corpuscles were specially con- 
cerned in the nutrition of the nervous and muscular tissues, 
while the white blood-corpuscles nourished the fibrous tex- 
tures — that fat selected fatty matter from the blood, muscle 
fibrinous material, and so on. 
In a paper which I communicated to this Society in 1864, 
I endeavoured to show that the blood, like the tissues, might 
be looked upon as composed of germinal or living matter, and 
formed material. The white blood-corpuscles and smaller 
corpuscles of similar character, which could be detected in 
the blood, being composed of germinal matter ; -while the red 
blood-corpuscles, the albumen, and some other constituents, 
were to be regarded as formed material, being composed of 
non-living matter, possessing peculiar characters, properties, 
and chemical composition, but resulting from changes taking 
