The History of a Mouthful of Bread

J >> Jean Mace >> The History of a Mouthful of Bread

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26

Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.

THE HISTORY OF A MOUTHFUL OF BREAD:
And Its Effect on the Organization of Men and Animals.

BY JEAN MACE.

Translated Prom the Eighth French Edition, By Mrs. Alfred Gatty.

EXTRACTS FROM THE PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION.

The volume of which the following pages are a translation, has been
adopted by the _University Commission at Paris_ among their prize
books, and has reached an eighth edition. Perhaps these facts speak
sufficiently in its favor; but as translator, and to some extent editor,
I wish to add my testimony to the great charm as well as merit of the
little work. I sat down to it, I must own, with no special predilection
in favor of the subject as a suitable one for young people; but in the
course of the labor have become a thorough convert to the author's
views that such a study--perhaps I ought to add, so pursued as he has
enabled it to be--is likely to prove a most useful and most desirable
one.

The precise age at which the interest of a young mind can be turned
towards this practical branch of natural history is an open question,
and not worth disputing about. It may vary even in different
individuals. The letters are addressed to a _child_--in the original
even to a _little girl_--and most undoubtedly, as the book stands, it is
fit for any child's perusal who can find amusement in its pages: while
to the rather older readers, of whom I trust there will be a great many,
I will venture to say that the advantage they will gain in the subject
having been so treated as to be brought within the comprehension and
adapted to the tastes of a child, is pretty nearly incalculable. The
quaintness and drollery of the illustrations with which difficult
scientific facts are set forth will provoke many a smile, no doubt, and
in some young people perhaps a tendency to feel themselves treated
_babyishly_; but if in the course of the babyish treatment they find
themselves almost unexpectedly becoming masters of an amount of valuable
information on very difficult subjects, they will have nothing to
complain of. Let such young readers refer to even a popular
Encyclopaedia for an insight into any of the subjects of the
twenty-eight chapters of this volume--"The Heart," "The Lungs," "The
Stomach," "Atmospheric Pressure,"--no matter which, and see how much
they can understand of it without an amount of preliminary instruction
which would require half-a-year's study, and they will then thoroughly
appreciate the quite marvellous ingenuity and beautiful skill with
which M. Mace has brought the great leading anatomical and physical
facts of life out of the depths of scientific learning, and made them
literally comprehensible by a child.

* * * * *

There is one point (independent of the scientific teaching) and that,
happily, the only really important one, in which the English translator
has had no change to make or desire. The religious teaching of the
book is unexceptionable. There is no strained introduction of the
subject, but there is throughout the volume an acknowledgment of the
Great Creator of this marvellous work of the human frame, of the daily
and hourly gratitude we owe to Him, and of the utter impossibility of
our tracing out half his wonders, even in the things nearest to our
senses, and most constantly subject to observation. M. Mace will help,
and not hinder the humility with which the Christian naturalist lifts
one veil only to recognise another beyond.

It will be satisfactory to any one who may be inclined to wonder how
a lady can feel sure of having correctly translated the various
scientific and anatomical statements contained in the volume, to know
that the whole has been submitted to the careful revision of a medical
friend, to whom I have reason to be very grateful for valuable
explanations and corrections whenever they were necessary. In the same
way the chapter on "Atmospheric Pressure," where, owing to the
difference between French and English weights and measures, several
alterations of illustrations, etc., had to be made, has received similar
kind offices from the hands of a competent mathematician.

* * * * *

MARGARET GATTY.

Ecclesfield, June, 1864.

NOTE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.

In May '66, the seventeenth edition of this work was on sale in Paris.
The date of Mrs. Gatty's preface, it will be observed, is June '64,
and at that time, the eighth French edition only had been reached.
That it should be a popular book and command large sale wherever it
is known, will not surprise any one who reads it: the only remarkable
circumstance about it is, that it should not have been republished
here long ere this. Even this may probably be accounted for, on the
supposition that the title under which the translation was published
in England, was so unmeaning--conveying not the slightest idea of the
contents of the book--that none of our publishers even ventured to
hand it over to their "readers" to examine.

The author's title, _The History of a Mouthful of Bread_, while
falling far short of giving a clear notion of the entire scope of the
work, is shockingly diluted and meaningless, when translated _The
History of a Bit of Bread!_

To the translation of Mrs. Gatty, which is in the main an excellent
one, for she has generally seized upon the idea of the author and
rendered it with singular felicity, it may be very properly objected
that she has taken some liberties with the text when there was any
conflict of opinion between herself and her author, and has given her
own ideas instead of his, which is, probably, what she refers to when
she calls herself "to some extent editor."

The reader of this edition will, in all these cases, find the thought
of the author and not that of his translator; for the reason that a
careful examination of the original has convinced the publisher that
in every instance the author was to be preferred to the translator,
to say nothing of the right an author may have to be faithfully
translated.

Besides making these restorations, the copy from which this edition
was printed has been carefully compared with the last edition of the
author and a vast number of corrections made, and in its present shape
it is respectfully submitted and dedicated to every one (whose name
is legion, of course) who numbers among his young friends a "_my
dear child_" to present it to.

CONTENTS.

I.--INTRODUCTION

FIRST PART MAN.

II.--THE HAND
III.--THE TONGUE
IV.--THE TEETH
V.--THE TEETH (_continued_)
VI.--THE TEETH (_continued_)
VII.--THE THROAT
VIII.--THE STOMACH
IX.--THE STOMACH (_continued_)
X.--THE INTESTINAL CANAL
XI.--THE LIVER
XII.--THE CHYLE
XIII.--THE HEART
XIV.--THE ARTERIES
XV.--THE NOURISHMENT OF THE ORGANS
XVI.--THE ORGANS
XVII.--ARTERIAL AND VENOUS BLOOD
XVIII.--ATMOSPHERIC PRESSURE
XIX.--THE ACTION OF THE LUNGS
XX.--CARBON AND OXYGEN
XXI.--COMBUSTION
XXII.--ANIMAL HEAT
XXIII.--ACTION OF THE BLOOD UPON THE ORGANS
XXIV.--THE WORK OF THE ORGANS
XXV.--CARBONIC ACID
XXVI.--ALIMENTS OF COMBUSTION
XXVII.--ALIMENTS OF NUTRITION (_continued_)--NITROGEN OR AZOTE
XXVIII.--COMPOSITION OF THE BLOOD

SECOND PART.

ANIMALS.

XXIX.--CLASSIFICATION OF ANIMALS
XXX.--MAMMALIA (_Mammals_)
XXXI.--MAMMALIA. (_Mammals_)--_continued_
XXXII.--MAMMALIA--_continued_
XXXIII.--MAMMALIA--_continued_
XXXIV.--AVES. (_Birds_)
XXXV.--REPTILIA. (_Reptiles_)
XXXVI.--PISCES. (_Fishes_)
XXXVII.--INSECTA. (_Insects_)
XXXVIII.--CRUSTACEA--MOLLUSKA. (_Crustaceans and Mollusks_)
XXXIX.--VERMES--ZOOPHYTA. (_Worms and Zoophytes_)
XL.--THE NOURISHMENT OF PLANTS
CONCLUSION

I.

INTRODUCTION.

I am going to tell you, my dear child, something of the life and nature
of men and animals, believing the information may be of use to you in
after-life, besides being an amusement to you now.

Of course, I shall have to explain to you a great many particulars
which are generally considered very difficult to understand, and which
are not always taught even to grown-up people. But if we work together,
and between us succeed in getting them clearly into your head, it will
be a great triumph to me, and you will find out that the science of
learned men is more entertaining for little girls, as well as more
comprehensible, than it is sometimes supposed to be. Moreover, you
will be in advance of your years, as it were, and one day may be
astonished to find that you had mastered in childhood, almost as a
mere amusement, some of the first principles of anatomy, chemistry,
and several other of the physical sciences, as well as having attained
to some knowledge of natural history generally.

I begin at once, then, with the _History of a Mouthful of Bread_,
although I am aware you may be tempted to exclaim, that if I am going
to talk only about that, I may save myself the trouble. You know all
about it, you say, as well as I do, and need not surely be told how
to chew a bit of bread-and-butter! Well, but you must let me begin at
the very beginning with you, and you have no notion what an incredible
number of facts will be found to be connected with this chewing of a
piece of bread. A big book might be written about them, were all the
details to be entered into.

First and foremost--Have you ever asked yourself _why_ people eat?

You laugh at such a ridiculous question.

"Why do people eat? Why, because there are bonbons, and cakes, and
gingerbread, and sweetmeats, and fruit, and all manner of things good
to eat." Very well, that is a very good reason, no doubt, and you may
think that no other is wanted. If there were nothing but soup in the
world, indeed, the case would be different. There might be some excuse
then for making the inquiry.

Now, then, let us suppose for once that there _is_ nothing in the
world to eat but soup; and it is true that there are plenty of poor
little children for whom there is nothing else, but who go on eating
nevertheless, and with a very good appetite, too, I assure you, as
their parents know but too well very often. Why do people eat, then,
even when they have nothing to eat but soup? This is what I am going
to tell you, if you do not already know.

The other day, when your mamma said that your frock "had grown" too
short, and that you could not go out visiting till we had given you
another with longer sleeves and waist, what was the real cause of this
necessity?

What a droll question, you say, and you answer--"Because I had grown,
of course."

To which I say "of course," too; for undoubtedly it was you who had
outgrown your frock. But then I must push the question further, and
ask--How had you grown?

Now you are puzzled. Nobody had been to your bed and pulled out your
arms or your legs as you lay asleep. Nobody had pieced a bit on at the
elbow or the knee, as people slip in a new leaf to a table when there
is going to be a larger party than usual at dinner. How was it, then,
that the sleeves no longer came down to your wrists, or that the body
only reached your knees? Nothing grows larger without being added to,
any more than anything gets smaller without having lost something; you
may lay that down as a rule, once for all. If, therefore, nothing was
added to you from without, something must have been added to you from
within. Some sly goblin, as it were, must have been cramming into your
frame whatever increase it has made in arms, legs, or anything else.
And who, do you think, this sly goblin is?

Why, my dear, it is _yourself!_

Ay! Bethink you, now, of all the bread-and-butter, and bonbons, and
gingerbread, and cakes, and sweetmeats, and even soup and plain food
(the soup and plain food being the most useful of all) which you have
been sending, day by day, for some time past, down what we used to
call "the red lane," into the little gulf below. What do you think
became of them when they got there? Well, they set to work at once,
without asking your leave, to transform themselves into something else;
and gliding cunningly into all the holes and corners of your body,
became there, each as best he might, bones, flesh, blood, etc.,
etc. Touch yourself where you will, it is upon these things you lay
your hand, though, of course, without recognizing them, for the
transformation is perfect and complete. And it is the same with
everybody.

Look at your little pink nails, which push out further and further
every morning; examine the tips of your beautiful fair hair, which
gets longer and longer by degrees; coming out from your head as grass
springs up from the earth; feel the firm corners of your second teeth,
which are gradually succeeding those which came to you in infancy; you
have _eaten_ all these things, and that no long time ago.

Nor are you children the only creatures who are busy in this way. There
is your kitten, for instance, who a few months ago was only a tiny bit
of fur, but is now turning gradually into a grown-up cat. It is her
daily food which is daily becoming a cat inside her--her saucers of
milk now, and very soon her mice, all serve to the same end.

The large ox, too, of whom you are so much afraid, because you cannot
as yet be persuaded what a good-natured beast he really is, and how
unlikely to do any harm to children who do none to him--that large ox
began life as a small calf, and it is the grass which he has been
eating for some time past which has transformed him into the huge mass
of flesh you now see, and which by-and-by will be eaten by man, to
become man's flesh in the same manner.

But, further, still: Even the forest trees, which grow so high and
spread so wide, were at first no bigger than your little finger, and
all the grandeur and size you now look upon, they have taken in by the
process of eating. "What, _do trees eat?_" you ask.

Verily, do they; and they are, by no means, the least greedy of eaters,
for they eat day and night without ceasing. Not, as you may suppose,
that they crunch bonbons, or anything else as you do; nor is the process
with them precisely the same as with you. Yet you will be surprised
hereafter, I assure you, to find how many points of resemblance exist
between them and us in this matter. But we will speak further of this
presently.

Now, I think you must allow that there are few fairytales more
marvellous than this history of bread and meat turning into little
boys and girls, milk and mice turning into cats, and grass into oxen!
And I call it a _history_, observe, because it is a transformation
that never happens suddenly, but by degrees, as time goes on.

Now, then, for the explanation. You have heard, I dare say, of those
wonderful spinning-machines which take in at one end a mass of raw
cotton, very like what you see in wadding, and give out at the other
a roll of fine calico, all folded and packed up ready to be delivered
to the tradespeople. Well, you have within you, a machine even more
ingenious than that, which receives from you all the bread-and-butter
and other sorts of food you choose to put into it, and returns it to
you changed into the nails, hair, bones and flesh we have been talking
about, and many other things besides; for there are quantities of
things in your body, all different from each other, which you are
manufacturing in this manner all day long, without knowing anything
about it. And a very fortunate thing this is for you: for I do not
know what would become of you if you had to be thinking from morning
to night of all that requires to be done in your body, as your mother
has to look after and remember all that has to be done in the house.
Just think what a relief it would be to her to possess a machine which
should sweep the rooms, cook the dinners, wash the plates, mend torn
clothes, and keep watch over everything without giving her any trouble;
and, moreover, make no more noise or fuss than yours does, which has
been working away ever since you were born without your ever troubling
your head about it, or probably even knowing of its existence! Just
think of this and be thankful.

But do not fancy you are the only possessor of a magical machine of
this sort. Your kitten has one also, and the ox we were speaking of,
and all other living creatures. And theirs render the same service to
them that yours does to you, and much in the same way; for all these
machines are made after one model, though with certain variations
adapted to the differences in each animal. And, as you will see
by-and-by, these variations exactly correspond with the different sort
of work that has to be done in each particular case. For instance,
where the machine has grass to act upon, as in the ox, it is differently
constructed from that in the cat which has to deal with meat and mice.
In the same way in our manufactories, though all the spinning-machines
are made upon one model, there is one particular arrangement for those
which spin cotton, another for those which spin wool, another for flax,
and so on.

But, further:

You have possibly noticed already, without being told, that all animals
are not of equal value; or, at least, to use a better expression, they
have not all had the same advantages bestowed on them. The dog, for
instance, that loving and intelligent companion, who almost reads your
thoughts in your eyes, and is as affectionate and obedient to his master
as it were to be wished all children were to their parents--this dog
is, as you must own, very superior, in all ways, to the frog, with its
large goggle eyes and clammy body, hiding itself in the water as soon
as you come near it. But again, the frog, which can come and go as it
likes, is decidedly superior to the oyster, which has neither head nor
limbs, and lives all alone, glued into a shell, in a sort of perpetual
imprisonment.

Now the machine I have been telling you about is found in the oyster
and in the frog as well as in the dog, only it is less complicated,
and therefore less perfect in the oyster than in the frog; and less
perfect again in the frog than in the dog; for as we descend in the
scale of animals we find it becoming less and less elaborate--losing
here one of its parts, there another, but nevertheless remaining still
the same machine to all intents and purposes; though by the time it
has reached its lowest condition of structure we should hardly be able
to recognize it again, if we had not watched it through all its
gradations of form, and escorted it, as it were, from stage to stage.

Let me make this clear to you by a comparison.

You know the lamp which is lit every evening on the drawing-room table,
and around which you all assemble to work or read. Take off first the
shade, which throws the light on your book--then the glass which
prevents it smoking--then the little chimney which holds the wick and
drives the air into the flame to make it burn brightly. Then take away
the screw, which sends the wick up and down; undo the pieces one by
one, until none remain but those absolutely necessary to having a light
at all--namely, the receptacle for the oil and the floating wick which
consumes it.

Now if any one should come in and hear you say, "Look at my lamp,"
what would he reply? He would most likely ask at once, "What lamp?"--for
there would be very little resemblance to a lamp in that mere ghost
of one before him.

But to you, who have seen the different parts removed one after another,
that wick soaked in oil (let your friend shake his head about it as
he pleases) will still be the lamp to you, however divested of much
that made it once so perfect, and however dimly it may shine in
consequence.

And this is exactly what happens when the machine we are discussing
is examined in the different grades of animals. The ignoramus who has
not followed it through its changes and reductions cannot recognize
it when it is presented to him in its lowest condition; but any one
who has carefully observed it throughout, knows that it is, in point
of fact, the same machine still.

This, then, is what we are now going to look at together, my dear
little girl. We will study first, piece by piece, the exquisite machine
within ourselves, which is of such unceasing use to us as long as we
do not give it more than a proper share of work to perform. Do you
understand? We will see what becomes of the mouthful of bread which
you place so coolly between your teeth, as if when that was done nothing
further remained to be thought about. We will trace it in its passage
through every part of the machine, from beginning to end. It will
therefore be simply only the _History of a Mouthful of Bread_ I
am telling you, even while I seem to be talking of other matters; for
to make that comprehensible I shall have to enter into a good many
explanations.

And when you have thoroughly got to understand the history of what you
eat yourself, we will look a little into the history of what other
animals eat, beginning by those most like ourselves, and going on to
the rest in regular succession downwards. And while we are on the
subject, I will say a word or two on the way in which vegetables eat,
for, as you remember, I have stated that they do eat also.

Do you think this is likely to interest you, and be worth the trouble
of some thought and attention?

Perhaps you may tell me it sounds very tedious, and like making a great
fuss about a trifle; that you have all your life eaten mouthfuls of
bread without troubling yourself as to what became of them, and yet
have not been stopped growing by your ignorance, any more than the
little cat, who knows no more how it happens than you do.

True, my dear; but the cat is only a little cat, and you are a little
girl. Up to the present moment you and she have known, one as much as
the other on this subject, and on that point you have therefore had
no superiority over her. But she will never trouble herself about it,
and will always remain a little cat. You, on the contrary, are intended
by God to become something more in intelligence than you are now, and
it is by learning more than the cat that you will rise above her in
this respect. To learn, is the duty of all men, not only for the
pleasure of curiosity and the vanity of being called learned, but
because in proportion to what we learn we approach nearer to the destiny
which God has appointed to man, and when we walk obediently in the
path which God himself has marked out for us, we necessarily become
better.

It is sometimes said to grown-up people, that it is never too late to
learn. To children one may say that it is never too early to learn.
And among the things which they may learn, those which I want now to
teach you have the double merit of being, in the first place amusing,
and afterwards, and above all, calculated to accustom you to think of
God, by causing you to observe the wonders which He has done. Sure am
I that when you know them you will not fail to admire them; moreover
I promise your mother that you will be all the better, as well as
wiser, for the study.

FIRST PART.--MAN.

LETTER II.

THE HAND.

At the foot of the mountains, from whence I write to you, my dear
child, when we want to show the country to a stranger, we commence by
making him climb one of the heights, whence he may take in at a glance
the whole landscape below, all the woods and villages scattered over
the plain, even up to the blue line of the Rhine, which stretches out
to the distant horizon. After this he will easily find his way about.

It is to the top of a mountain equally useful that I have just led
you. It has cost you some trouble to climb with me. You have had to
keep your eyes very wide open that you might see to the end of the
road we had to go together. Now then, let us come down and view the
country in detail. Then we shall go as if we were on wheels.

And now let us begin at the beginning:

Well, doubtless, as the subject is eating, you will expect me to begin
with the mouth.

Wait a moment; there is something else first. But you are so accustomed
to make use of it, that you have never given it a thought, I dare say.

It is not enough merely that one should have a mouth; we must be able
to put what we want within it. What would you do at dinner, for
instance, if you had no hands?

The hand is then the first thing to be considered.

I shall not give you a description of it; you know what it is like.
But what, perhaps, you do not know, because you have never thought
about it, is, the reason why your hand is a more convenient, and
consequently more perfect, instrument than a cat's paw, for instance,
which yet answers a similar purpose, for it helps the cat to catch
mice.

Among your five fingers there is one which is called the thumb, which
stands out on one side quite apart from the others. Look at it with
respect; it is to these two little bones, covered over with a little
flesh, that man owes part of his physical superiority to other animals.
It is one of his best servants, one of the noblest of God's gifts to
him. Without the thumb three-fourths (at least) of human arts would
yet have to be invented; and to begin with, the art not only of carrying
the contents of one's plate to one's mouth, but of filling the plate
(a very important question in another way) would, but for the thumb,
have had difficulties to surmount of which you can form no idea.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26