Diversions of a NaturalistLankester, E. Ray (Edwin Ray), Sir
History
Diversions of a Naturalist
Lankester, E. Ray (Edwin Ray), Sir
Natural history
This view is supported by the fact that in recent years a disease of
infants similar to scurvy, and called "infantile scurvy," has been
described by Sir Thomas Barlow, and fully recognized. It is a condition
of "malnutrition," and is accompanied by "rickets," and is due in the
first place to failure of the mother's milk, and secondly to the bad
quality of the cows' milk substituted for it. Owing to the danger
of infection by bovine tubercle-bacillus and the great expense of
"certified" milk from specially selected cows (eightpence a quart),
it is customary to boil the milk given to children. There seems to
be no doubt that good milk, freshly boiled, is satisfactory. But the
constant use of sterilized milk and so-called Pasteurized milk, as
well as inferior "watered" and more or less stale milk, is frequently
the cause of infantile scurvy. Something is destroyed in the milk by
prolonged heating which is necessary for its proper action as a food.
The addition to the milk of a small quantity of fresh meat-juice
or beetroot-juice appears to replace this destroyed matter, and to
prevent malnutrition and scurvy. And thus the babies are rescued from
"infantile scurvy." Here, again, it is a question of the presence of a
minimal quantity of an easily destroyed proteid, which is necessary to
start the nutritional process and to keep it going.
A very interesting case of the unsuspected influence of minute
quantities of such a "proteid" body (that is, a body like casein and
albumen, but higher in the complexity of its chemical structure and
nearer to the readily destroyed chemical complexity of living matter
itself) has lately been discovered. In the East, especially amongst
Chinese "coolies" and other people who feed on rice, a very troublesome
disease is known, called "Berri-berri." It is chiefly marked by pains
all over the body, lassitude, and debility, and renders its victims
unfit for labour, and so causes great inconvenience to employers of
"Chinese cheap labour." All sorts of causes have been suggested for
it. But it has now been found that it is due to the feeding of the
coolies with "polished rice." This is an inferior rice, the grains
of which have become (by bad, damp storage) rough and powdery on the
surface. The bad rice grain is purchased by dealers and shaken up and
sifted so as to get rid of this dull surface, and is then known as
"polished rice." The grain has lost its outer coat. It has been found
that domesticated birds (pigeons and fowls) fed on this polished rice
become ill with symptoms like those of "Berri-berri," and even die.
And it has been further discovered that these same birds can be cured
by mixing some of the separated outer coat of sound rice grains with
the "polished rice." The result of this observation on birds has been
applied to human patients suffering from "Berri-berri." It is found
that they are rapidly cured by giving them rice "outsides" to eat, and
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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