Among the operative part of the community we meet with innumerable examples of an opposite condition of the system, where, from excess of labour, a greater expenditure of energy and substance takes place than what their deficient diet is able to repair. It is true that the disproportion is generally not sufficient to cause that immediate wasting which accompanies actual starvation, but its effects are nevertheless very palpably manifest in the depressed buoyancy, early old age, and shorter lives of the labouring classes. Few, indeed, of those who are habitually subjected to considerable and continued exertion survive their forty-fifth or fiftieth year. Exhausted at length by the constant recurrence of their daily task and imperfect nourishment, they die of premature decay long before attaining the natural limit of human existence. In those states of the system, again, such as fever, during the continuance of which most of the secretions are vitiated, and that of the gastric juice often entirely suppressed, and where food would consequently be hurtful rather than advantageous, appetite is scarcely felt, and loathing often occupies its place. But the moment that, by the diminution of the disease, the secretions and exhalations begin to return to their healthy state, and nutrition is resumed, appetite begins to be again felt, and by-and-by becomes abundantly vigorous, in order to restore the system to its former state. The utmost caution, however, is still required in its gratification, as a premature indulgence is almost certain again to stop the secretions and to produce a relapse. Ignorance of this principle among the community at large, and the consequent error of giving food when there is no demand for it, and no gastric juice to digest it, often do more to defeat the best laid plan of cure than the severity of the disease itself. The sick man’s friends, in their anxiety to support his strength, too frequently turn a deaf ear to every caution which is suggested, and stealthily administer sustenance when the system does not require it, and when it serves only to aggravate the danger and increase the weakness of the patient. Since the first publication of the preceding passage, I have seen a striking example of its truth. The patient was gradually recovering from inflammation of the chest, for the cure of which low diet was for a time indispensable. By way of _supporting the diminished strength_, the relations began to give prematurely and clandestinely, about double the quantity of food which was prescribed. For twenty-four hours, an increase of strength was felt accordingly; but very soon it passed into febrile excitement with a quick pulse and _increased weakness_. A dangerous relapse followed, and its cause was then found out. Abstinence was again enforced and tartar emetic given to excite nausea. To the surprise of the very injudicious friends, the excitement began almost immediately