PHYSIOLOGY OF COMMON LIFE.
Incentives to action-Cause of hunger: waste and repair of the body-Periodicity of hunger-Comparison of the organism with a steam-engine inaccurate-The blood of starving men-Starvation-Cases of prolonged fasting in animals-Fabulous stories of long fasting in men and women-Aspects of starvation-The parts of the body which first disappear in starvation-Sleeplessness of starving menAgonies of starvation-Pathetic stories-The sensation of hunger, and its causeHunger as a general, and as a local, sensation-Thirst as a sensation-Cause of thirst-Necessity of water in the organism, and consequences of deficiencyThirst as a mode of torture-Story of the Black Hole of Calcutta-How to quench thirst-The drink of animals-Effects of thirst.
HUNGER is one of the beneficent and terrible instincts. It is, indeed, the very fire of life, underlying all impulses to labour, and moving man to noble activities by its imperious demands. Look where we may, we see it as the motive power which sets the vast array of human machinery in action.
It is Hunger which brings these stalwart navvies together in orderly gangs to cut paths through mountains, to throw bridges across rivers, to intersect the land with the great iron ways which bring city into daily communication with city. Hunger is the invisible overseer of the men who are erecting palaces, prison-houses, barracks, and villas. Hun