In filling very slowly our thin artificial alimentary canal, note the distention along the canal as the gas accumulates. Then note that the elastic bands stretch as the various segments of the canal change location, especially the stomach and portions of the small intestine and of the colon, etc. The stomach, small intestine, and colon, as they dilate, shift about for room. The abdomen is seen to bulge out some four or more inches while the turmoil is heard going on inside. Continue this inflation and our rubber intestinal tract will display here and there a displacement and permanent abnormal enlargement of the lumen or bore. Suppose, further, that our complete model of the abdominal viscera and wall had tightly around its outer surface unelastic corsets, skirt bands, trouser bands, vests, etc., all or any of which held in or compressed its bulging wall--what would happen? Why, something inside would slip out of place or burst and let all the wind escape, relegating our creation to the rubbish heap. Now, when a man loses his wind by the rupture of a tube, he is said to have expired, and his body is sent to the crematory--or ought to be sent there for sanitary reasons. It would be much more satisfactory, by the way, to our friends, after our demise, were our bodies sterilized while they “live.” I hope I have made it clear that it is a most serious pathological condition--inasmuch as it prevents the normal onward progress of ingesta and feces--to permit of the continued existence of an excessively dilated gastro-intestinal canal, with one or more of its segments permanently enlarged--segments like the stomach, duodenum, cæcum, transverse colon, sigmoid flexure, rectum, etc.--and with pendulous abdomen, sallow and muddy complexion, etc. When to this condition is added a general displacement of the abdominal viscera, or of one or more of the organs of the abdominal and pelvic cavities, you have an objective picture of chronic ill health in all its severity. Are you sincerely desirous to know how your friends feel when you greet them? Don’t ask them the stereotyped question, “How do you do?” or, if you are a German, “How do you go it?” or, if you are a Frenchman, “How do you carry yourself?” But ask them the specific and sensible question appropriate to our civilized habits: “How are you and your bowels to-day?” And at parting it were well to say: “May peace be with you both--you and your bowels!” The spirit of man can torment his personality, and his personality in turn can vex his spirit.