Finally, I am able to demonstrate to you the following instructive
experiment. In the presence of some of my listeners, whom I had invited
to attend an hour before the lecture, I carried out the following
procedures on two dogs, both of which had ordinary gastric fistulæ and
were, besides, œsophagotomised. Into the stomach of one, while its
attention was distracted by patting and speaking kindly to it in order
to avoid arousing any thoughts of feeding, a definite number of pieces
of flesh were introduced through the fistula. The morsels were threaded
on a string, the free end of which was fastened to the fistular cannula
by inserting a cork. The dog was then brought into a separate room and
left to itself. A like number of pieces was introduced into the stomach
of the other dog in the same way, but during the process a vigorous
sham feeding was kept up, the animal being afterwards left alone. Each
dog received 100 grams of flesh. Since then an hour and a half have
elapsed, and now we may draw the pieces of flesh out by means of the
thread and weigh them. The loss of weight, and consequently the amount
of flesh digested, is very different in the two cases. In that of the
dog without sham feeding the loss of weight amounts to merely 6 grams,
while the flesh withdrawn from the stomach of the other dog weighs only
70 grams, that is to say, was reduced by 30 grams. This, therefore,
represents the digestive value of the passage of food through the
mouth, the value of an eager desire for food, the value of an appetite.
I give also a series of figures obtained by Dr. Lobassoff in analogous
experiments. Into the dog’s stomach 25 pieces of flesh (100 grams)
were brought. The flesh remained two hours in the cavity. Without sham
feeding 6.5 per cent, with eight minutes' sham feeding 31.6 per cent,
of the quantity was digested.
Again: the flesh remained an hour and a half in the stomach; without
sham feeding 5.6 per cent, with five minutes' sham feeding 15 per cent,
was digested.
Once more: the flesh remained five hours in the stomach; without sham
feeding 58 per cent, with sham feeding 85 per cent, was digested, the
balance of undigested food being 42 per cent in the one case and 15 per
cent in the other.
I must, however, add that from the nature of this experiment it is not
well adapted for class demonstration, and may often fail. On the one
hand, it is not at all easy to conceal the introduction of the flesh
from the dog; on the other, the unusual and distracting surroundings
of the animal often causes a short period of sham feeding to have less
effect than would otherwise pertain. In order to avoid such failures
it is better before an audience to carry out this experiment only
on dogs accustomed to appear in the lecture theatre, and of whose
temperament the experimenter is well assured.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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