DR. PROUT ON ANIMAL CHEMISTRY. 
499 
principles—at least this is the most probable conclusion. We 
have thus a beautiful provision of nature; for the soda, in the act 
of being elicited with the bile, is again brought into union with 
the acid separated in the stomach, where it combines with it, and 
thus by its agency further decompositions are effected, and the 
incipient chyle is separated from the excrementitious matters. 
Admitting that the above decomposition is effected by the im¬ 
mediate agency of galvanism, we have in the principal digestive 
organs a sort of galvanic apparatus, of which the mucous mem¬ 
brane of the stomach, and perhaps the intestinal canal generally, 
may be considered as the acid or positive pole, while the hepatic 
system may be considered as the alkaline or negative one. Whe¬ 
ther this be admitted or not, which is a matter of no great import¬ 
ance, the above may be considered as a simple expression of facts, 
as far as the saline matters of the blood are concerned; and in 
conjunction with these, and by the aid of the same energies, there 
are several other very important processes or changes carried on, 
some of which I hope hereafter to be able to elucidate. 
Before we quit this subject we may make a few remarks on 
cookery, the object of which is, or ought to be, to facilitate the 
solution of the alimentary matters, by combining them with water, 
and thus to aid the stomach in effecting the important process 
under consideration. 
Animals feeding exclusively on vegetables are well known to be 
furnished by nature with an extensive apparatus of stomachs and 
other organs, admirably adapted for the purpose of macerating and 
reducing their refractory food to the purposes of their economy. 
But man, who is evidently intended to live on vegetable products, 
in part at least, has not been furnished with this apparatus, and 
hence we may conclude that the deficiency was intended to be 
supplied by his ingenuity and the artificial processes of cookery. 
Now, the different processes of baking, roasting, boiling, &c., are 
all, as before observed, of a reducing character; and by their 
united effects the most refractory substances, even the woody fibre 
itself, may be reduced to the state of a wholesome and nutritious 
bread. With respect to this subject it may be remarked, in ge¬ 
neral, that it is infinitely easier to reduce a principle from a high 
to a low condition, than the reverse. Thus the strongest sugar 
may be easily made weak, or may even become so by mere keep¬ 
ing ; but when once reduced to this state, I believe it never can 
be restored again, so as to render it well adapted for the purposes 
of the sugar-boiler. And here it may not, perhaps, be amiss to 
make a few remarks on what is termed French cookeiy, in oppo¬ 
sition to that generally employed in this country. In France 
most substances are exposed, through the medium of oil or butter* 
