The Jasper weekly courier. [volume] (Jasper, Ind.) 1858-1922, 1879-07-11

1t has long been considered. as by
common consent a law of health, that
all food should be eaten slowly, not
swallowed until well masticated.
Some observations and experiments,
however, have been recently made which
indicate strongly that this principle OF
slow eating, so far as health is concern
ed. is not true with respect to all yarie-
ties Of food.
Animals in state of nature, as is gen.
orally recognized, tend TO accommodate
themselves in the most favorable man
ner to their conditions; il COW natural
" Eliminates, why should dog natural
" take chunk of meat at swallow
without stopping 70 chew itP 1t may
be said thai the ruminant has special
digestive apparatus, but the fact re-
mains that the food Is eaten as Is best
suited to il, and the dog, following ma
ture, does what is best for him, or, in
other words, il il disagreed with his di-
gestion to eat rapidly, he would reform
and take it more slowly. Following ont
this idea, experiments were made upon
a dog, with the following results: II
the meat, before being fed 10 the dog,
was reduced TO hash, or cut into fine
pieces, the digestion was ut best imper-
feet, a considerable portion OF the undi-
gested or imperfectly digested meat be-
ing found i'm the excreta. II, under the
same conditions, meat was fed to the
dog in large pieces, It was bolted at a
gulp, with the result that little, If any,
passed through undigested; compared
with the result from the chopped meat,
il could be called a perfect digestion for
the coarse form, rs compared with de-
cidedly imperfect digestion for the fine
form. So far as simple experiment
goes, this must be pretty conclusive for
the dog; but gan the same hold true
with respect to the human subject?
A brief review of the first portion Of
the digestive process, SO far as under
stood with re ard to man, will help in
answering this; and first to be consid-
cred Is the mouth and chewing appa-
ratus. Says Foster: I" The chief pur-
pose served by the saliva in digestion Is
to moisten the food, and SO assist in
mastication and deglutition. I.
In man. it has a specific solvent action
on some of the food stuffs. On fats 1t
has only q slight emulsifying action,
and on proteids none. Its character
istic propertyis that Of converting starch
into grape-sugar." According TO
wundt, +" the mouth secretions possess.
besides mechanical, chiefly chemical
action-the changing over Of the starch
and glycogen contained in the food into
sugar. The ferment body, which pro-
duces this transformation, ptyaline, is
not q specific element Of the mouth Sc
erection, since, aside from the intestinal
secretions, all tissues and fluids OF the
body contain starch-ferment.
From this 1t will be seen that no di.
gestive action on meat or animal food
takes place before reaching the stomach,
and that, for vegetable food even, the
action OF the mouth -secretions Is faI
from all-important.
As TO the mechanical action Of the
mouth in preparing the food for deglu'
tition, this is not specially necessary fol
morsels Of meat Of the ordinary size in
troduced into the mouth, while for 4
large portion OF the vegetable or plan,
products eaten--and ii is upon these
that the saliva exerts its chemical action
mastication is necessary before they
can DO swallowed. The meat foods arc
in themselves sufficiently moist, while
many dried fruits, breads, and the like
in endless variety, first need thorough
reduction.
A piece Of jelly the size Of walnut
would give little trouble in swallowing
since II Is moist and Of a yielding char
acter, while few can swallow pill thu
! size Of a pea without distress. Teeth