Rural Hygiene by Hardpress & Ogden Henry N

Author:Hardpress & Ogden Henry N. [Hardpress & N., Ogden Henry]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Sanitation, Household, Rural health
ISBN: 9781313101912
Google: 0naxmQEACAAJ
Amazon: 1313101915
Publisher: HardPress
Published: 2013-01-14T18:30:00+00:00

FOOTNOTES:

[2] c.c. = cubic centimeter, or centister. A centimeter is about 2/5 of an inch (.3937). 1 cubic inch is about 16-1/2 c.c.

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CHAPTER XII

FOODS AND BEVERAGES

Before discussing the question of suitable foods for individual needs or the ill-health which is so likely to follow an unrestrained or unwise diet, it will be well to trace briefly the passage of food through the human body, with the various changes which take place in its mass from the time it enters the mouth until it is absorbed by the stomach.

The human mechanism.

In a little book by Hough and Sedgwick entitled "The Human Mechanism," the authors point out that in many respects the human body is like any machine developing energy by the conversion of certain kinds of raw material. Thus, as the steam engine will use up coal in the development of mechanical energy, so the human body will absorb food and convert it into vital energy, and it is quite as important that the human body shall have its source of energy properly adjusted to its needs as that the steam engine shall be fired with coal possessing a reasonable amount of heat-producing particles.

The human body requires this supply of raw material for several different purposes. In the first place, the very fact of living uses up each minute a number of cells of various kinds in various organs. Each breath taken, each heart beat, each muscular motion, all tend to the destruction of tissue and involve its reconstruction. Violent exercise uses up cell tissue very rapidly, so much so that a football player will commonly lose from five to ten pounds in weight during a well-contested game. It is a fundamental principle of training for any athletic event involving hard exercise, that suitable food in large quantities must be provided, and a young man training for football or rowing will eat beefsteak, eggs, and other hearty food to an astonishing amount, all of it going chiefly to repairing worn-out and used-up tissue.

In the second place, food is needed to supply material for growth, and so it is that a growing boy eats out of all proportion to his size, and the fact that he seems to be, as it is said, hollow clear to his feet, is only his rational endeavor to supply the material needed for his growing body.

In the third place, food must be supplied for the work to be done by the body, as distinguished from the loss of tissue due to the performance of the work, and finally, food must be provided in order to maintain the bodily temperature, a larger amount being naturally required where the difference between the temperature of the body and the outside air is very great, as in the Arctic regions.

The human body being a special kind of machine, the raw material supplied must be adapted to the needs of the machine, and while a lump of coal admirably supplies energy for a steam boiler, no one would think

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