Foods for the fat : a treatise on corpulency, with dietary for its cure / by Nathaniel Edward Davies.

Date:
1889
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Foods for the fat : a treatise on corpulency, with dietary for its cure / by Nathaniel Edward Davies. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    15. The laws of nature,' he continues, 'are such as to c duce to an adaptation of the supply of food to the demand We are all conversant with the fact that exercise and exposure to cold—conditions which increase the demand for food- sharpen the appetite, and thus lead to a larger quantity of material being consumed, while conversely a state of inactivity and a warm climate tell in an opposite manner and reduce the inclination for food. A badly-fed labourer is capable of per- forming but a slight day's work, and a starving man falls an easy victim to the effects of exposure to cold. 16. ' Practically it is found that hard work is best performed under a liberal supply of nitrogen-containing food {i.e., meat). The reason is that it leads to a better nourished condition of the muscles and the body generally. Under the use of animal food which is characterized by its richness in yZes/t-forming matter, the muscles are observed to be firmer and richer in solid constituents than under subsistence on food of a vegetable nature;' and it is also obvious that under animal food there is not that danger to corpulency which obtains under a vegetable diet, unless from that vegetable diet be eliminated those particular articles that contain too large a percentage of sugar and starch. To sum up, science teaches us that a liberal supply of meat is necessary to maintain muscles in a good condition for work, as exercise is to make them firm and red, and the result of experience tends to confirm it. 17. None the less is it necessary to limit a meat diet and dilute it with a proper admixture of vegetable and other material, and only where it becomes a question of reducing corpulency does it matter what vegetable is taken for this purpose or relatively the amount. In these pages those vegetables only are given the percentage in which of the fattening principles is not in excess of what the system can bear. A large and varied choice still remains to satisfy the epicure and the gourmet. 18. In any dietary for the reduction of corpulence, it is necessary to bear this in mind, that there is a limit beyond