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In some cases of sickness, when not accompanied with vomiting, half a teaspoonful of salt in a little water is sometimes most effective. Whenever there is a feeling of nausea the stomach is relaxed, there is the usual amount of the gastric juice, but it is deficient of the hydrochloric acid; therefore a small solution of salt takes the place really of the acid, and the sickness is relieved, it likewise supplies the chloride of sodium, which has been abstracted from the gastric fluid.
In violent attacks of colic, if there is no other remedy at hand, a teaspoonful of salt in a pint of cold water, which the patient may sip, is most speedy in relieving the sufferer. The same will also relieve a person who has had a heavy fall and is partly unconscious.
In hæmorrhage from the lungs, when the usual remedies have failed, a solution of salt will sometimes arrest it. When applied to a cut the bleeding ceases. These little facts are well worth knowing, because salt is always to be found in every home, and so may be given or applied in case there is no medical man at hand; matrons and nurses of small hospitals, infirmaries, and workhouses should be acquainted with them in case of an emergency.
We have now before us the properties of salt in a medical and dietetic sense; that indirectly it is a therapeutical agent of some value cannot be denied; that it is an important aliment is a fact which cannot be explained away; and that it is a preserver of health all must allow.
That it is of a deleterious tendency is a mere assertion as unsubstantial as “thin air,” and as flimsy as gossamer —magno conatu, magnas nugas.
CHAPTER VIII
PHYSIOLOGICAL PROPERTIES
Prejudice is the daughter of ignorance; and nothing exemplifies the truth of this more thoroughly than the senseless repugnance to salt which is now so remarkably prevalent. Ask these persons for their reasons, if we can dignify them as such, for disliking salt; their answers, as a rule, will be trifling platitudes, altogether unworthy of refutation, or even of moderate attention.
Objections founded on imperfect, or an affectation of knowledge, are not worth the trouble of confuting, even if they be supported by a fair amount of intelligence; but when the opponents of salt begin to base their assertions upon science, and demur on medicinal, dietetic, and physiological grounds, then we must meet them armed with similar weapons to those they have chosen, with the handling of which they are but imperfectly acquainted, and which therefore recoil upon them in such a way as prove that though they may be shrewd, they are but badly informed and credulous scientists.
At the present day the science of physiology has arrived at such a pitch of perfection that there is not a single secretion, tissue, or organ of the body, with the exception of the spleen, which has not been investigated, and the functions divulged and made so plain that it is quite divested of that apparent mystery which formerly enshrouded it; though our kind friends, the anti-vivisectionists, would willingly adopt the most unjust measures to prevent the study of life from being more perfect than it already is: they protest with well-feigned horror at a frog or a rabbit, under the influence of chloroform, being experimented upon for the benefit of humanity, while they see, without allowing a sign of disapprobation to escape from them, an inoffensive hare chased to death for the amusement of gentility, and probably gloat over, with pleasure, the dying agonies of a stag: a sight which gratifies the somewhat questionable proclivities of refined and elegant ladies, who race their horses out of breath to gaze on the sanguinary scene.
Had it not been for physiological research we should not have known that the chloride of sodium was such an important constituent in the animal economy; we should have been in utter ignorance of the science of life, and we should never have known how man is begotten, how developed, or how he dies. With regard to the two processes of decay and repair, or how the human organism, from a mere cell, gradually becomes a being highly organised, mentally as well as physically, we should have known nothing. Physiology has been a boon to humanity and an inexhaustible field of research to the scientific.
In a chemical point of view there is no more important mineral constituent in the human body than the chloride of sodium, for it occurs nearly in every part of the system, both solid and fluid, in close and intimate relation with the organic compounds, and it materially influences their chemical and physical properties; for instance, the albumen partly owes its solubility to the presence of salt, the quantity of which causes the differences which it presents as regards its coagulation; pure caseine, which is quite insoluble, is dissolved at once on the addition of common salt; and if it is added in increased proportions it impedes the coagulation of the fibrine. Another remarkable physiological fact is that the chloride of sodium is not only uniformly present, but its various proportions are nearly definite and constant, both in the fluids and tissues; and the existence of a provision for the limitation of the quantity kept in the system causes the proportions to be little affected, in the way of excess at least, by the amount of salt the food may contain, that is, if the diet is wholesome and the individual healthy.
According to Lehmann, who experimentalised on himself, the blood may contain in a normal state 4·14 parts of the chloride of sodium in 1000, and after a meal of very salty food it may be only increased to 4·15; he says it only rose to 4·18 when two ounces of salt had been taken an hour before, and two quarts of water had been drunk in the interval. The blood will not receive more than a certain amount; and as an over-amount of salt will produce extreme thirst, a quantity passes through the kidneys with the water that has been drunk; frequent drinking of course causes frequent micturition. If we take the mean of numerous observations by several experimenters, the average quantity of urine voided by healthy adult males is about 52-1/2 fluid ounces; this quantity may contain urea to the amount of 512·4 grains, chlorine 105·0 grains, and soda 125·? grains, besides other salts and extractives. If such an amount passes out with the urine we can easily account for the slight increase in the blood of Lehmann.
The quantity of the chloride of sodium in the blood is liable to great variation in different diseases; and there can be little doubt that this variation is closely connected (though whether in the relation of cause or in that of effect, we are not exactly entitled to surmise) with the histological and other transformations of the component parts of the blood. The proportions of salt greatly differ in several tissues, and also at different periods of the development of the same tissue. “Thus in muscle,” according to Enderlin, “100 parts of the ash left after incineration of ox-flesh yielded nearly 46 per cent. of the chloride of sodium and potassium; which, as this ash constitutes 4·23 per cent. of the dried flesh, would give 1·94 as the proportion of the chloride of sodium in 100 parts of the latter; and reckoning this dried residue to constitute 28 per cent. of the whole substance of the muscle (the remaining 77 parts being water) the proportion of chloride of sodium in the latter will be 0·44. These figures, as will be presently seen, bear a remarkably close correspondence to those which represent the proportion of chloride of sodium in the ash, solid residue and entire mass of the blood.”57
Next to muscle, cartilage contains the largest amount of the chloride of sodium, and this especially in the temporary cartilages of the fœtus, its place being taken by the phosphate of lime as it approaches the time of birth. The percentage of the chloride of sodium contained in the ash of the costal cartilage of an adult is about 8·2; in the laryngeal cartilage 11·2; but as the ash does not constitute above 3·4 per cent. of the entire substance the percentage of the chloride of sodium in the latter is, at the most, 0·38 of the whole, or less than that of blood and muscle. Only from 0·7 to 1·5 per cent. could be extracted from the ash of bone.
Besides the important uses of the chloride of sodium in the blood to which we have already adverted, it serves the purpose of furnishing the hydrochloric acid required (by many animals, at least) for the gastric secretion; and it likewise supplies the soda-base for the alkaline phosphate, whose presence in the blood appears to serve a most important purpose in the respiratory process. Moreover, there is reason to think, from the experiments of Boussingault upon animals, as well as from other considerations, that the presence of salt in the blood and excreted fluids facilitates the deportation of excrementitious substances from the blood. The proportion in which it occurs in the principal animal fluids is represented by the following table, constructed by Lehmann chiefly from his own analyses; it is highly interesting, and shows us at a glance that it is more important in the economy than any other substance, and is significant of the fact that health cannot exist long if the chloride of sodium is below the normal amount.
Percentage of Chloride of Sodium in various Animal Fluids, their Solid Residue and their Ash.
We have thus proved physiologically that the chloride of sodium holds a most prominent position among the other constituents of the body; that it is present in considerable quantities in muscle as well as in the blood; and that it furnishes the acid, which is necessary for the stomach to perform its functions of digestion. It holds the albumen partly in solution, and its coagulation is dependent more or less on the amount of salt which is present in the blood, and it also possesses the power of preventing the coagulation of the fibrine. In fevers the blood is generally thicker, and has a tendency to coagulate by reason of the partial absence of salt, because a good deal passes off with the perspiration; and fever patients always prefer salt to sugar, for while one refreshes them and helps to restore the usual healthy tone of the palate, by constringing the papillæ of the tongue, the other raises feelings of disgust.
It is also present in cartilage, though in a lesser degree than in blood or muscle, because in cartilage there is no disintegration or waste of tissue, and therefore it does not require such a perpetual supply; there is, on the contrary, a continual loss going on in muscle, especially during exertion. Perspiration is to a certain extent the principal medium which carries off the chloride of sodium, owing to its being held in solution by the liquor-sanguinis; during fatigue, particularly if prolonged, a greater quantity passes off, producing various degrees of thirst. That the normal proportion of the chloride of sodium should be regularly maintained must be obvious.
In febrile disease the fibrine of the blood is materially increased, and there is also a marked decrease of salt, which is dependent on a greater or lesser intensity of the attack, rendering the blood denser, owing to the fact of the tendency of the fibrine to coagulate by reason of the diminution of the chloride of sodium, causing the blood to circulate slowly and with difficulty.
In some other morbid conditions, which we have already noticed, the blood becomes thinner and poorer; and consequently the system degenerates, and we get an anæmic, or chlorotic tendency, especially if there is a scrofulous diathesis. There are other blood diseases, as the reader may suppose, and which are more truly such, than those to which I have just alluded, into the phenomena of which it is not necessary to enter.
In health what a decided difference! the specific gravity of the blood is uniformly equable;58 it circulates with comparative ease; and the whole system is permeated with the life-giving and health-preserving chloride of sodium, and the coagulation of the fibrine is prevented by nothing else but that mineral and inorganic substance – salt, which at the same time purifies and maintains the equalisation of the constituents of the blood. By it also the hydrochloric acid is supplied to the stomach, enabling that organ to perform its functions of digestion in accordance with the laws of health; and it likewise furnishes the alkaline phosphate “whose presence in the blood appears to serve the most important purpose in the respiratory process.”
What stronger evidence do we require to prove the salutary efficacy of salt? No wonder that it is so frequently reverted to in Holy Writ; neither can it be a source of surprise that it has been so carefully cherished and extensively utilised from time immemorial. What is to be regarded as an extraordinary anomaly is that there are not a few who are entire strangers to its virtues, and who prefer impurity and defilement to the luxury of health and cleanliness.
Those who desire more conclusive proof of the utility of salt, of its necessity in the animal economy, and of the peculiar morbid phenomena to which its absence in the system gives rise, I would refer to two articles which appeared at different times in the Medical Press and Circular, and in the Medical Times and Gazette.59 The cases I there mention occurred in different localities, and they demonstrate incontestably that parasites, especially the lumbrici (the tæniæ are well known to infest adults of impure habit), are sometimes the origin of strange and incomprehensible symptoms of a deceptive character, rendering diagnosis extremely difficult and unsatisfactory, and frequently endangering the lives of the sufferers. Is it not a blessing to know that nature has munificently provided a means whereby these distressing evils may be checked and definitely eradicated by a daily use of such an enemy to, and destroyer of, disease as the chloride of sodium, universally known as common salt?
CHAPTER IX
CONCLUSION
It is invariably a relief when one’s task is completed, and more so when it is self-imposed. Putting our thoughts and opinions upon paper for others to peruse and to criticise, is pleasure combined with not a little anxiety; for one cannot with any degree of certainty predict what kind of reception one’s efforts may have from the public, who are frequently led to a choice of books on the recommendation of critics and reviewers; so that an unknown author is placed at a great disadvantage, and at the mercy of those who may laud a book to the skies if they please, satirically criticise another, and pass over a third with a sarcastic smile or a significant shrug of the shoulders. I am afraid that my little volume will unfortunately be found amongst the latter, but I candidly acknowledge that I hope it will be regarded as belonging to the first, or at least to the second.
As I have simply written it in order to point out the virtues of an aliment of the greatest interest in whatever light we may look at it, I trust that if I have not instructed, I have at any rate afforded pleasure to those who have thought it worth their while to glance over its pages; and I shall be quite contented if they have derived as much satisfaction in reading, as I have experienced in writing it.
I have tried to impress upon the reader the advisability, and indeed the necessity, of using the bountiful gifts of nature in a manner consistent with common sense, and not to follow blindly and credulously the whims and conceits of others, but to regard their frantic efforts to indoctrinate the thoughtless, with that dispassionate indifference which is the sign of philosophical complacency and superiority. Lucretius says truly that “nothing is more delightful than to occupy the elevated temples of the wise, well fortified by tranquil learning, whence you may look down upon others and see them straying in every direction, and wandering in search of the path of life.”
Approbation is pleasing, and particularly so when it comes from those who are more able to judge impartially and correctly than others; and censure, if deserved, though far from gratifying, is not of a nature to intimidate or to create discouragement.
With these concluding remarks, and certain misgivings, I now submit my short work to the indulgent consideration of those who read for the sake of obtaining information, those who read for amusement only, and to those who peruse literary productions with the eye of criticism. Lord Bacon advises us to “Read, not to contradict and confute, nor to believe and take for granted, nor to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. That is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.”
In conclusion, I must say that I sincerely hope that the candid reader has reaped improvement where the critic may have found only matter for censure.
APPENDIX
A., page 38. “Occasionally lakes are found which have streams flowing into them, but none flowing out. Such lakes are usually salt. The Caspian Sea in Asia is an example. It is called a sea from its great extent, but it is in reality an inland lake of salt water.”
B., page 80. Mr. William Barnard Boddy on “Diet and Cholera”: “The nourishment we derive from the flesh of some animals is not so compatible with the well-being of our constitutional wants as others, particularly the swine, which was altogether prohibited by the Jewish lawgiver, independent of its spiritual enactments, because it produced ‘leprosy.’ Now pork is largely consumed in England, especially by the poorer classes, and in ninety-nine cases out of every hundred is almost invariably succeeded by diarrhœa; and we need not be surprised at this when we look at the filthy habits of this animal; its impure feeding and liability to the diseases of measles and scarlet-fever. But when we know that they are often in this state killed and sold as an article of food, the liability to disease of course is much greater. But this is not all, as relates to this class of society, for almost – I might say positively so – every article upon which they subsist is impoverished by vile adulterations, and worse, putrefactions; their limited means enabling them to procure only the half-decomposed refuse of the vegetable market, and the half-tainted meat from the butchers’ shambles.
“The more wealthy command all the luxuries of life in abundance, and, agreeable to their inclinations and appetites, feast accordingly. Over-indulgence however, often repeated, at last exhausts the healthy tone of the stomach, and blunts the keen edge of desire; and in order to produce a false appetite, condiments of various kinds and degrees are substituted; so that, in fact, the food becomes nearly as vitiated by these additions as that of the poor man’s by subtractions – the one of necessity, the other of choice. Extremes meet, and here ‘the rich and poor meet together;’ for under both circumstances the animal economy must severely suffer, and the ‘blood, which is the life,’ becomes weak and serous; and though for a time, from the great reluctance health has to depart, the growing evils of an impure and unwholesome diet may not be perceived or apprehended, yet insensibly, from the perpetual inroads made upon the constitution, and the delicate seat of life, the efforts to resist disease become weaker and weaker, till at last the whole mass is left without any internal active principle of sound health available to resist or overcome its effects.”
