Editorial note — Chapter III

Here 1 stands for a convalescent who can bear only enough to preserve life; 2, the condition of rest; 3, moderate motion of from 5 to 6 English miles' walk daily; 4, severe labor = a walk of 20 English miles daily; 5, very severe labor = to a day's walk of 14 English miles, with a load weighing 60 lbs. If the fat be given in terms of starch, the aggregate need of both substances in the case of 1 is 6.6 times as great as the need of plastic substance; in the case of 2, 3, 4, and 5, respectively 5.7, 5.2, 4.8 and 4.0 times as much.

A Dutch soldier doing garrison duty receives daily, in times of peace, 0.333 kilogrammes of wheat flour, 0.125 of meat, 0.850 of potatoes, 0.250 of vegetables, containing in the aggregate 60 grammes of albumen. In forts, where the service is more severe, he receives 0.50 kilogrammes of wheat flour, 0.06 of rice or groats, with an aggregate amount of 116 grammes of albumen. (Mulder, Die Ernährung in ihrem Zusammenhange mit dem Volksgeiste, übersetzt von Molecshott, 1847, 58 seq.) According to the researches of Dr. Smith, in order to avoid the diseases caused by hunger, a man needs, on an average, to take 4,300 grains of carbon and 200 grains of nitrogen in his daily food; a woman 3,900 grains of carbon and 180 grains of nitrogen. In 1862, the workmen in the famishing cotton industries of Lancashire were actually reduced to just about this minimum. (Marx, Kapital, I, 642.) Death from starvation occurs in all vertebrates when the loss of weight of the body, produced by a want of food, amounts to between two-fifths and one-half of what it was at the beginning of the experiment. (Chossat, Recherches expérimentales sur l'Inanition, 184, 3.)