Rensselaer Union, Volume 6, Number 46, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 August 1874 — The Stomach. [ARTICLE]

The Stomach.

This important organ is a muscular sack formed by a dilation of the alimentary canal. In shape it somewhat resembles a curved section of a cone; in size it varies from eight to twelve inches in width, and from three to four in its greatest diameter. It is usually estimated to contain about one (fuart when in a perfectly normal condition; but so universally are excesses committed in eating and drinking that in scores of observations we do not remember to have seen a single one that had not been dilated beyond this capacity. Its situation varies considerably, according as it is distended with food or otherwise; its proper position is just below the liver. It is of a purely carnivorous type; being intended only for the dissolving or chymifaction of the food which has been finely triturated by the teeth. It furnishes by far the most important of the five solvents concerned in digestion—the gastric juice. It actually digests, or reduces to chyme, all the elements of the food except the non-nitrogenous and hydro-carbons, or sugar, starch and oil. Of these, sugar and starch are digested by the duodenal juices; oils by the pancreatic fluid. Of its physiological functions we know much; the celebrated Martin case,wherein a permanent fistula or opening followed a terrible gun-shot wound, having afforded wonderful facilities for study ing its functions and given a great impetus to the investigation of all the de tails of alimentation. Many important facts have been thus obtained; some physiologists even go so far as to lay down laws for the exact time in which any given article of food would be digested, and, consequently, classifying all such as wholesome or unwholesome according as they seemed to resist the action of the digestive powers of the stomach, or otherwise. By such rules pigs’ feet and tripe were laid down as being digested in an hour; trout, in one and a half hours; milk, in two hours; roast beef, in three; and so on, until the climax was reached with roast pork and boiled cabbage, which, they said, required five and one-half hours for their proper digestion. But, from close observation, it is our belief that stomachs have as many ■whims and idiosyncrasies as have their masters, and that which is easily digested by one is *' poison” to another. Hence, the folly of any set of rules which prescribe just what all persons shall eat. Each person should know enough of his own temperament and physiological organization to be able to select those articles of food which are best adapted to _his own individual wants. Treated from 1 his common-sense standpoint, many of the fearfully numerous diseases of the digestive organs would cease to exist. But we go on, defying or ignoring Nature’s laws; eating, in half the time required for perfect mastication, double the amount necessary for our sustenance; jumping up and going at hard brain work immediately after each meal when we ought to take complete mental relaxation for some time in order that out nerve forces may be properly concentrated. upon the digestion of our food; drugging ourselves with stimulants when we see our digestive powers are beginning to fail until the inevitable result follows and we become confirmed dyspeptics. We then pounce upon the stomach as the unlucky source of all our evils, forgetting that a large percentage of our food was never intended to be "digested by it; forgetting that Nature has given us organs of locomotion, demanding that . they beexercised; free; pure air, requiring it to be breathed; proper hours for repose, and insisting on their being so occupied. Indigestion may also be intestinal, and aggravated by the use of sugar or starchy substances; or it may be pancreatic, and increased by the improper use of oils; or it may be due to a torpid liver or deficient nerve energy, and rendered doubly worse by sedentary habits. Treat your stomach as becomes a rational being;' live in accordance wifi the laws of nature,, taking due exercise, pure air, good food that is suited to your own peculiar organization, and, above all, allow yourself plenty of cheerful, mirth-provoking relaxation and it will be impossible for you to suffer from indigestion.— Pacific Rural Preet. *