Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 January 1885 — EATING BEFORE SLEEPING. [ARTICLE]

EATING BEFORE SLEEPING.

A Journalist's Experience, of Vklne to i-V Mankind la General. _ The notion is widely prevalent that it is unhealthy to eat late at night or just before retiring. This came from the severe denunciation of ’‘late suppers” contained in all the old popular works on diet The argument in these publications was not directed against what was involved in s late snppec, at a period when the revelers slipped from their chairs and spent the night under the table, or were carried by waiting lackeys insensible to their beds. It was the midnight debauch that was the object of attack, and even here it was less the gluttony than the drunkenness which alarmed she doctors and called forth their reprehensions. A man may indnce apoplexy by gorging himself with food at any hour of the day, but the bottle after bottle of heady wine or the bowles of hot punch at the evening revel were what did the business for most who ran a brief career of dissipation to an untimely grave. Man is the only animal that can be taught to sleep quietly on an empty stomach. The brute creation resent all efforts to coax them to such a violation of the laws of nature. The lion roars in the forest until he has found his prey, and when he has devoured it he sleeps over until he needs another meal. The horse will paw all night in the stable, and the pigs will squeal in the pen, refusing all rest and sleep until they are fed. The animals which chew their cud have their own provision for a late meal just before dropping off to their night slumbers. Man can train himself to the habit of sleeping without a preceding meal, but only after long years of practice. As he comes into the world nature is too strong for him, and he must be fed before going to sleep. A child’s stomach is small, and when perfectly filled, if no sickness disturbs it, sleep follows naturally and inevitably. As digestion goes on the stomach begins to empty. A single fold in it will make the little sleeper restless; two will awaken it, and if it is hushed again to repose the nap is short, and three folds put ah end to the slumber. Paragoric or other narcotic may close its eyes again, but wifchont*either food or some stupefying drag it will not sleep, no matter how healthy it may be. Not even an angel who learned the art of minstrelsy in a celectial choir can sing a babe to sleep on a empty stomach. We use the oft-quoted illustration, “sleeping as sweetly as an infant,” because this slumber of a child follows immediately after its stomach is completely filled with wholesome food. This sleep which comes to adults long hours after partaking es food, and when foe stomach is nearly or quite empty, is not after the type of infantile repose. There is all the difference in the world between the sleep of refreshment and the sleep of exhaustion. To sleep well, the blood that swells the veins in the head during onr busy hours must flow back, leaving a greatly diminished volume behind the brow that lately throbbed with Buch vehemence. To digest well, this blood is needed at the stomach and near the fountain of life. It is a fact established beyond the possibility of contradiction that sleep aids digestion, and that the process of digestion is conducive to refreshing sleep. It needs no argument to convince ns of this mutual relation. The drowsiness which always follows a well-ordered meal is itself a testimony of nature to this interdependence. The waste of human life by the neglect of the lesson is very great. The daily wear and tear of the body might be restored more fully than it usually is if this simple rule was not systematically violated. Sleep is wonderfully recuperative, but it may be shorn of half its benefits by unfavorable conditions. Fonl air in the bedchamber leaves the sleeper almost as exhausted in the morning as when, weary with the day’s labor, he sank upon the bed. A gnawing stomach, empty of food, takes out of the nightly sleep that refreshing sense of comfort which properly belongs to it It leaves the blood to throb in the heated brow, andiiannts the sleep with an ever-present source of disquiet It is like the sleep which the mother takes while her sick child is under the care of watchers in another room. An uneasy stomach is , just like an aching heart in its effects upon the nightly repose. A healthy person who goes to bed on a full stomaoh will always wake in the morning with a better appetite for breakfast If dinner is eaten in the middle of the day and a light supper is served at 6 in the afternoon, a hearty luncheon should be provided at 10 in the evening, or jfot before the hour of retiring. The role should be to eat at the last moment before going to bed, whatever that honr- may be. And the latest meal should not be of “light” viands, as this phrase is commonly understood. The less a person hats at any time of cake or pie, or the countless flummeries that go to make up a fancy tea-table, the better, but none of these should be eaten at bedtime. Cold chicken, cold roast beef, corned beef, or wholesome meat of any kind, with well-baked bread and butter (sauce and pickles will do no harm) will serve the substantial requisites for this collation. Milk is perhaps the best of all where the pure article can be obtained; “Borden’s condensed” will supply it in the best shape to suit the taste, and if that is used it should be mixed with warm or hot water, instead of cold, and eaten before it cools. With bread and fruit (baked apples will serve when berries and peaches fail) this makes a very wholesome evening meal. All persons should he very cautious when they reform their habits in this respect. A mouthful or two each night at first is all that should be attempted gradually- increasing the quantity until luncheon becomes a pretty substantial meal. If indigestion follows at any times, chewing " the meat of one or two peach pits (for the prnssic acid in thorn) after eatingis better than sending for a doctor. With a clear conscience and a full stomach, any man in tolerable health may derive from his nightly sleep that Recuperation which ought to come from this sweet restorer of life’s daily wear and waste. —David M. Stone, in New York Journal of Commerce.