results from a true combustion occurring at every moment in every
portion, however small, of our bodies. We are at first a little
startled and, it may be, alarmed at being told that our bodies are
continually undergoing combustion, with which word we connect
the notion of flame and burning, the tortures of exposure to a red
or white heat, and the destruction of living tissues which follows
their exposure to such temperatures.
But the most inflammable bodies, such as charcoal, or sulphur,
or phosphorus, admit of being burned in a chemist's vessels, so
as to evolve, moment by moment, either a very large or a very
small amount of heat, as may be desired ; and the difference in the
intensity of the heat thus generated is mainly determined by the
quantity of air furnished in a given time to the burning com-
bustible. It is of a very slow combustion, such as, if it occurred
out of the body, would not occasion the evolution of light at all,
that we are to think as occurring in our bodies. The fuel for this
combustion is charcoal and hydrogen, the inflammable constitu-
ents of wood and coal and candles. Fat consists almost entirely
of these inflammables ; sugar and starch are less rich in them. To
burn those bodies air is requisite, and when it burns them, it
changes the charcoal into carbonic acid and the hydrogen into
water ; and this is one great, perhaps the chief reason, why we are
constantly inhaling air by those important living bellows, the
lungs. The air thus inspired dissolves in the blood, and is carried
by the arteries which convey that blood to every part of the living
frame". There is no point at which, if pricked, it will not bleed
red blood; and wherever red blood is there is air, and wherever
air is there is combustion. We are thus to conceive of our bodies
as owing their heat, not to one single furnace blazing at the heart
or the lungs, but, as it were, to an infinite number of tiny lamps,
each giving out a very small quantity of heat, yet enough to keep
warm its immediate neighbourhood. Now those lamps, though
they burn very low in some diseases, are never extinguished as long
as life lasts ; and the chief reason of their continual burning is the
unceasing supply of air which fans their flame. It is sufficient for
the support of life that we take food at certain intervals, and we
can occasionally fast for long periods without material inconve-
nience; but we cannot stop breathing, except for a very few
minutes, without inducing a fatal result. Our living bodies are
thus like furnaces without dampers, in which there is no provision
for diminishing the draught of air, so as to economize the fuel
when it is scarce. The mouth and nostrils are an ever-open fur-
nace-door, by which air is continually entering the body ; and it
never leaves the body till it has taken from it so much of its char-
3
XXX11 PHILOSOPHY OF COOKERY.
coal and changed that into carbonic acid, and so much of its hydro-
gen and changed that into water. These pass away chiefly in the
air we expire ; for our throats serve the curious double purpose of
acting as bellows-tubes to carry air to the lamps burning within
us, and as chimneys to carry their invisible smoke away.
Page 8
Presented as published in 1886. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
results from a true combustion occurring at every moment in every portion, however small, of our bodies. We are at first a little startled and, it may be, alarmed at being told that our bodies are continually undergoing combustion, with which word we connect the notion of flame and burning, the tortures of exposure to a red or white heat, and the destruction of living tissues which follows their exposure to such temperatures.
But the most inflammable bodies, such as charcoal, or sulphur, or phosphorus, admit of being burned in a chemist's vessels, so as to evolve, moment by moment, either a very large or a very small amount of heat, as may be desired ; and the difference in the intensity of the heat thus generated is mainly determined by the quantity of air furnished in a given time to the burning combustible. It is of a very slow combustion, such as, if it occurred out of the body, would not occasion the evolution of light at all, that we are to think as occurring in our bodies. The fuel for this combustion is charcoal and hydrogen, the inflammable constituents of wood and coal and candles. Fat consists almost entirely of these inflammables ; sugar and starch are less rich in them. To burn those bodies air is requisite, and when it burns them, it changes the charcoal into carbonic acid and the hydrogen into water ; and this is one great, perhaps the chief reason, why we are constantly inhaling air by those important living bellows, the lungs. The air thus inspired dissolves in the blood, and is carried by the arteries which convey that blood to every part of the living frame. There is no point at which, if pricked, it will not bleed red blood; and wherever red blood is there is air, and wherever air is there is combustion. We are thus to conceive of our bodies as owing their heat, not to one single furnace blazing at the heart or the lungs, but, as it were, to an infinite number of tiny lamps, each giving out a very small quantity of heat, yet enough to keep warm its immediate neighbourhood. Now those lamps, though they burn very low in some diseases, are never extinguished as long as life lasts ; and the chief reason of their continual burning is the unceasing supply of air which fans their flame. It is sufficient for the support of life that we take food at certain intervals, and we can occasionally fast for long periods without material inconvenience; but we cannot stop breathing, except for a very few minutes, without inducing a fatal result. Our living bodies are thus like furnaces without dampers, in which there is no provision for diminishing the draught of air, so as to economize the fuel when it is scarce. The mouth and nostrils are an ever-open furnace-door, by which air is continually entering the body ; and it never leaves the body till it has taken from it so much of its char-
XXX11 PHILOSOPHY OF COOKERY.
coal and changed that into carbonic acid, and so much of its hydrogen and changed that into water. These pass away chiefly in the air we expire ; for our throats serve the curious double purpose of acting as bellows-tubes to carry air to the lamps burning within us, and as chimneys to carry their invisible smoke away.