Ellis's Primary Physiology. Or Good Health for Boys and Girls

CUT VEINS AND BROKEN LIMBS

The veins carry the blood back to the heart. If one is cut the blood is dark and flows steadily. It is managed more easily than an artery; all that need be done is to place some lint over the wound and bandage it firmly. This, of course, you will do as soon as possible.

If you should be so unfortunate as to break or dislocate a limb, assume an easy position and calmly await the coming of the surgeon. If a finger only is fractured you can walk to his office.

What is said of this little book? To what are we liable and what should we know?

What should be cultivated?

What is the rule concerning a blister which may form on any part of the body?

What is a good thing for boils? For the stings of insects? For slight burns?

What is the remedy for continued bleeding at the nose?

What is the proper course if your clothing should take fire?

What should be done with a person when he faints?

What is a boy apt to do when his ears or feet are frost-bitten?

Give the proper course to be followed.

What should be done with a slight cut?

How can you know that an artery has been cut? What must be done?

What is the office of the veins? What need be done if one of them is wounded?

Suppose your arm or leg is broken, what is the proper course? If it is only a finger?

CHAPTER XV

THE NERVES, BRAIN, SPINAL CORD, ETC

The muscles which move the bones are themselves moved by the nerves. The nerves are soft and pulpy in youth, but harden as you advance in years. They are composed of a gray substance, called the nerve-cell, and a white substance, known as the nerve-fibre.

The brain is the mass of nervous tissue within the skull. It is so tender and easily harmed that nature has walled it about by a hard, bony structure to protect it from injury.

The gray substance of the nerves is where nervous impulses begin, which are conducted along the white substance. The gray matter may be compared to a telegraph office where the message is started, while the white matter is the wire along which the message travels.

The spinal cord, or marrow, is a mass of soft, nervous tissue, which fills the hollow running the length of the spine or backbone.

From the base of the brain twelve pairs of nerves are given off to the face and head. One pair passes to the eye, and gives sight; one passes to the nose, and gives smell; one, to the mouth, tongue, and palate, and gives taste; one, to the ears, and gives hearing; and others to the face, neck, and head, and give the expressions of joy, sorrow, pain, anger, and doubt.

From the spinal cord thirty-one pairs of nerves pass to the various parts and organs of the body.

There could be no motion or feeling without the nerves, although they are not the true centres of either. If you obey the rules of health, as already laid down, you will be in the happy condition of those of whom it is said they do not feel that they have any nerves at all.

What move the muscles? How are the nerves in early youth? Of what are they composed? What are these parts called?

What is the brain? How is it protected?

Where do nervous impulses begin? To what may the gray and white matter be compared?

What is the spinal cord?

How many pairs of nerves are given off from the brain? From the spine? Where do they go?

What is said of sensation and feeling? What if you obey the laws of health?

CHAPTER XVI

SUNSTROKE AND POISONS

Don't be afraid of the sun. Its rays give life and vigor not only to men and animals, but to the vegetable world. A little tanning or browning of the skin is good for you. In summer when the rays are very strong, you should avoid them; but at other times, live in the sunlight all you can.

Very rarely indeed is a child sunstruck; but it is wise to guard against it, because it is often fatal. As I have just told you, you must keep out of the direct rays of the sun when the day is very hot. It is well to carry a wet handkerchief, or several large green leaves in the crown of your hat.

SYMPTOMS OF SUNSTROKE

The symptoms of sunstroke are stinging pains in the head, dizziness, weakness, confusion of sight, and in some cases, sickness at the stomach. The person becomes partly or wholly insensible and often moans or snores. Sometimes he has spasms.

HOW TO TREAT SUNSTROKE

Should you ever see any one thus affected, do your utmost to have him taken at once to the coolest place that is near at hand, and where there is plenty of fresh air. The clothing should be removed and the body sponged with cold water, if the surface is warm; if it is cool, warm water should be used.

If the patient's body is very hot, his pulse high, he snores or moans, and is limp and senseless, he should be laid upon his face, his head slightly raised and cold water poured upon it for several minutes, from a height of four or five feet.

CAUTION

If the pulse is feeble and fast, the breathing light, and the body cool, the treatment just named would be highly dangerous. The patient must be given small doses of diluted brandy or whiskey, and a blister applied to the back of the neck. Of course a physician will be sent for at once.

POISONS

It may happen that a child swallows by mistake some kind of poison (when he is alone), and when a few minutes' delay in reaching a physician will be fatal. The best and indeed the only thing to do is to produce instant vomiting. Stir a tablespoonful of salt or a teaspoonful of mustard in a tumbler of warm water and swallow without a moment's delay.

At the end of five minutes, repeat the dose, and continue doing so for half an hour. If vomiting does not take place immediately, bring it on by thrusting the forefinger down the throat, since vomiting alone will save your life.

SULPHURIC ACID POISON

There is but one poison which cannot be thrown off by the means just described. If water is drank directly after swallowing sulphuric acid, it will be fatal. Vomiting must be induced by using the finger.

A SAFE RULE

The only safe rule for children, as well as for grown persons, is never to swallow or touch anything which they are not certain can do them no harm. When there is the least doubt, leave it alone.

What is said of sunlight? When should the rays be avoided?

What should be carried in the crown of the hat when the sunlight is very strong?

Describe the symptoms of sunstroke.

What is the first thing to do when a person suffers sunstroke? Suppose the surface of the body is warm? Suppose it is cool?

If the body is hot, pulse high, he snores, is limp, etc.?

If the pulse is feeble and fast, breathing light, body cool?

What course should be followed if poison is taken by mistake? Suppose the dose described does not cause vomiting?

What of sulphuric acid?

What is the only safe rule?

CHAPTER XVII

CIGARETTE SMOKING

I have now a few words to say to the boys. I hope the girls will also listen, and help to impress the words on their friends.

Most of you have fathers, mothers, and perhaps brothers and sisters. You love them more than all the world. What would you think if I should tell you I can make you hate your mother, strike your father, lie, cheat, steal, do everything vile, and at last send you, disgraced and despised, to a wretched death?

You are shocked and cannot believe it; but, if you will walk the path I mark out, you will do just what I have said and reach the dreadful end – that is, if you live long enough.

SMOKING CREATES A MORBID THIRST

The first step is cigarette smoking. It will give you catarrh, weaken the lungs, cause heart disease, destroy the health, and create a morbid thirst which will lead you to the second step, – the drinking of cider, beer, and malt liquors. Soon you will crave stronger fluids, and will swallow gin, wine, brandy, whiskey, rum, and all sorts of seductive drinks made from alcohol.

SMOKING DEGRADES THE TASTES

By this time, you will be far along the road to ruin. You will begin to look upon your father and mother as slow, and will love the company of the wicked, and hate that of the good. Then will follow misery, woe, and eternal ruin.

BAD EFFECTS SHOWN IN TIME

You know plenty of boys who smoke cigarettes, and you cannot see that they suffer any harm on that account. But, as in many other instances, the harm comes after a time; and often when too late to be cured. A great many boys die every year from cigarette smoking, and thousands upon thousands are stricken by disease from that cause alone.

QUALITY OF CIGARETTE TOBACCO

In 1883, about three quarters of a billion of cigarettes were smoked in this country, of which more than one half were made in the city of New York. The tobacco used is the worst that can be found anywhere. Saltpetre is mixed with it to prevent moulding. Physicians will tell you that saltpetre, when thus taken into the system, is very hurtful.

The Havana cigarette is made of fair tobacco, but is rolled in thick, vile paper and soaked with creosote, which is very hurtful. But those cigarettes which pretend to be made of Cuban tobacco are imitations that are as bad as they can be.

CIGARETTE PAPER

The oil of tobacco is highly poisonous; but the oil of the paper used for cigarette wrappers is worse than that. It burns white, because of the acids and chemicals in it.

HURTFUL TO THE YOUNG

Smoking is specially harmful to the young. It weakens the stomach, causes indigestion, hastens the action of the heart, thus producing palpitation.

PRODUCES CATARRH

Cigarette smoking is almost certain to produce catarrh, one of the most offensive and incurable diseases. This arises from the fact that the cigarette being much shorter than a cigar, the smoke is inhaled to a greater extent. You have seen boys swallow the smoke and puff it through the nostrils, thus inviting catarrh.

CAUSES ASTHMA

Cigarette smoking tends also to cause asthma.

OTHER EVIL EFFECTS

It renders the system more liable to attacks of pneumonia and bronchitis. It destroys a healthy appetite for solid food, and by the constant spitting it causes, excites a craving for drink. Many instances are known where the nerves of the eye have been destroyed by cigarette smoking. The following are the words of Dr. S. H. Keep, one of the leading physicians of Brooklyn:

“If one could select a fine, healthy boy of from twelve to fifteen years of age, well known for his fine physique, even disposition, and great strength, and start him in his career as a cigarette smoker under the observant eye of the public, what results might not accrue from such example as the panorama was unfolded to them?

“The decay of physical power, emaciation, the irritable temper, the sallow complexion, the drawn and anxious look, the unsteadiness of the hands, the dyspepsia, the capricious appetite, the aversion to parental and other advice, the tendency to seek lower companionship, could hardly fail to leave its impress upon such an audience.

“More especially in the nervous diathesis* does this rapid decay make itself apparent, and in varying degrees according to the amount of indulgence. Physicians daily watch this process with pain and anxiety for those intrusted to their care. Indeed, if my own professional experience were to be my guide, I could declare the evil of cigarette smoking to be even greater than that of alcohol.”

So alarming has become this evil that in some States, laws have been passed against cigarette smoking. But I trust that if any of you has felt like forming the vile habit, your own good sense will not allow you to do so.

What is the first step toward the ruin of the body and soul? What is the second step? What follows?

Where will you be by this time? What then will follow?

How is it that some boys do not seem to suffer from cigarette smoking? What takes place every year?

How many cigarettes were smoked in this country in 1883? Of what are they generally made? What of saltpetre?

What is said of the genuine Havana cigarette? Are there many genuine ones made?

What of the oil of tobacco? Of the oil of the paper?

How does smoking affect the young?

What loathsome disease is almost certain to result from cigarette smoking? Why?

What does cigarette smoking tend to produce? What other effect has it on the system? What is its effect on the appetite? How does it excite a craving for drink?

What is said by Dr. Keep, of Brooklyn?

What has been done by some of the States? What are your own views on the vice of cigarette smoking? Are you weak-minded enough to be persuaded ever to place a vile cigarette between your lips?

CHAPTER XVIII

ALCOHOL

Alcohol does not exist in nature. It is a fluid made by fermentation, or the rotting of vegetables and their juices. Beer, cider, and wine are produced by the decay of a sweet liquid taken from grain or fruits. Alcohol is that element in malt and spirituous liquors which produces intoxication.

ITS DANGER

Alcohol is indigestible and lessens the muscular power. No person training for any severe contest would dare swallow a drop of it. Its great danger lies in its attractiveness. It makes one at first feel in high spirits, reckless of right and wrong, and it destroys his judgment and sense. You all know that an intoxicated person talks like an idiot.

EFFECT UPON THE ORGANS OF THE BODY

Alcohol destroys the nerves, ruins the stomach, weakens the muscles, affects the heart, bloats the body, kills the liver, causes insanity, and makes men descend lower than the beast of the field. It turns wise men into fools; peaceable persons into brawlers; good citizens into wicked and dangerous ones; and is the direct cause of more than three fourths of all the crimes in the country.

COST OF ALCOHOL

The total cost of alcoholic drinks each year is eight times that spent for education. The saloon-keepers outnumber the ministers of the gospel four to one. Sixty thousand people die annually from alcohol.

Those who use alcohol are very liable to disease. In Russia the cholera swept off one year every drinking person in a certain town before it affected a single temperate one. In New Orleans, five thousand drinking men died one season from yellow fever before it touched a sober one. In 1832, in Park Hospital, New York, out of 204 cases of cholera, only six were men of temperate habits; these all recovered, while 122 of the others died.

Sir John Ross, the famous Arctic explorer, never used alcohol or tobacco. On one of his voyages, when a youth, every one of the crew that was a drinker, died; but he himself was not sick a single hour. When exploring the frozen regions, he was an old man, the oldest of his crew being twenty years younger than he. His men used tobacco and spirits, but he went without either; and with his advanced years, stood the rigors and hardships better than any of them.

At a recent meeting of surgeons and officers of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company to arrange for medical and surgical supplies to be placed on trains and at each station on the road, the question of adding alcoholic stimulants to the supplies was at once rejected; some of the surgeons claiming that in case of shock from injury, it was worthless.

INTOXICATION

Intoxication leads a person to do that which he would not do when sober if he dared. It therefore takes away the self-restraint that is the safeguard of society.

A GRAVE ERROR

One of the greatest mistakes of the young is the belief that a person can drink a little beer, cider, wine or liquor now and then, without danger to himself. No one ever began drinking with the belief that he would die a drunkard; he meant to drink when he felt like it with his friends, but was sure he could stop when he chose.

TOTAL ABSTINENCE A SAFEGUARD

Even if a person were able to keep to a moderate use of alcohol all his life, his brain and nervous system would become diseased. When epidemics visit any place, the first persons to die, as I have shown, are those accustomed to drink liquor.

EFFECT UPON THE MIND AND SOUL

Poisonous as is alcohol to the body, it is more fatal to the mind and heart. It clouds the brain, dwarfs and blots out the good impulses, and increases the power of the passions and the baser side of our nature.

The world is full of moral and mental wrecks caused by alcohol. You see them about you; the most wretched drunkard on which you ever looked was once a bright, hopeful boy like you. He could not have been made to believe he would ever fall so low.

Your only safety is to resolve never to touch alcohol in any form. Not only that, but it is your duty to do all you can to keep others from injuring themselves by its use.

Does alcohol exist in nature? What is alcohol? How are beer, cider, and wine produced? What element is alcohol?

What is said of alcohol? In what lies its great danger? What are its effects at first?

Show some of the evil effects of alcohol. Of what is it the direct cause?

Compare the cost of alcoholic drinks and the sums spent for education. How do the number of saloon-keepers compare with that of the ministers of the gospel? How many people does it kill annually?

To what are drinkers of alcohol liable? Illustrate this statement by what occurred in Russia. In New Orleans. In New York.

Prove the advantages of leaving tobacco and spirits alone by some facts respecting Sir John Ross.

What action was taken recently by the surgeons and officers of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company?

What does intoxication lead a person to do? What does it therefore take away?

What is one of the greatest mistakes of the young?

Suppose a person really could restrain himself to a moderate use of alcohol?

How does alcohol affect the mind and heart?

What is said of the most wretched drunkard in the land?

What is the only safety? What is the duty of every one?

CHAPTER XIX

BONES, SKELETON, ETC

The bones are the frame-work of the body. Like the muscles, they are generally found in pairs, one for each side of the body. Their number is more than two hundred. When joined together, in their proper position, they make a skeleton, as shown in the picture on page 115, where the names of the principal bones are given.

A bone is composed of animal and mineral substance. The animal part gives it elasticity, and the mineral, hardness. In youth there is more of the animal substance, but it grows less as a person becomes older. This explains why the bones of a child do not break so readily as those of an aged person, and why, when broken, they heal much sooner. Sometimes when a very old man or woman has a limb broken, the bone will not “knit,” or heal at all.

The movable joints are joined by bands or ligaments, which are very strong. They often refuse to yield, when the bone to which they are fastened is broken. If a ligament is strained or hurt, a “sprain” is caused, which may be as bad as a broken bone.

Boys and girls are apt to form bad habits by which some of the bones become misshapen. You should hold your head erect, but not thrust forward; keep the chest expanded and the shoulders well back. You will find, after awhile, that this healthful posture is the most pleasant you can take, and it will give you the form which nature intends all of us to have.

What are the bones? How are they generally placed? How many bones have you? What is a skeleton?

Of what is a bone composed? What does the animal part give? The mineral? Why is the bone of a child less liable to break than that of an older person? What takes place sometimes when the bone of an old person is broken?

How are the movable joints joined? What is said of the strength of a ligament? What is a “sprain”?

What are boys and girls apt to do? What is the proper posture? What will you find?

CHAPTER XX

A CHEERFUL DISPOSITION

Every boy and girl should cultivate a cheerful disposition. You will have grief and trouble, and must shed many a tear; but cheerfulness does more than anything else to lighten the burdens of life.

Have a kind word for every one. If there is a deformed boy or girl in school, never notice it by look or word. If a boy has a drunken father or any disgrace attaches to his family, always act as though you never heard of it. If he is poor and in need, make him such presents as you can afford. It will add much to your own happiness if now and then you give something which you think you cannot afford.

If some little girl wears odd-looking dresses, do not hurt her feelings by laughing at her. Show her kindness and make her feel at home when in your company.

Be respectful to old age. Elderly persons are sometimes fretful and say provoking things to children; but it is easy for you to keep back all impudent replies and to show that you feel no ill will toward them.

You should not only be obedient to your parents, but should feel pleasure in obeying them. No matter how you are employed, or what your own wishes are, show an eagerness to do whatever they may request. When father and mother leave you forever, you will be thankful beyond expression, if you can say you never caused them to shed a tear or feel any sorrow.

Be respectful and obedient to your teacher. Strive to obey all his rules in spirit and letter. Be attentive to what he says, and show by your conduct as well as by your words that you are grateful for his interest in and labors for you. It is you who will feel the most pleasure at all times, by striving to be cheerful. In truth, you will not have to strive long, for it will come natural to be cheerful.

Don't sulk and never repay evil for evil. If some one has done you an injury, the best way to “get even” is by an act of kindness; but be ready to protect the helpless against those who would oppress them. There are persons whose coming is like so much beautiful sunshine; there are others who are cross and disagreeable and whom no one likes. Strive, every day, to make some one happy, and live by the Golden Rule, “Do unto others as you would have others do to you.”

What should every boy and girl cultivate? Why?

What about kind words? Suppose you have a deformed class-mate, or one to whom some disgrace attaches?

Suppose some little girl wears odd-looking clothes?

What of old age?

In what does true obedience to your parents consist? What will be the result of such obedience?

How should you treat your teacher? Who is most benefited by such a course of action?

What of sulking? What is the best manner of “getting even” with some one who has done you a wrong? What should you strive every day to do? What is the Golden Rule of life?

CHAPTER XXI

THE DIGESTIBILITY OF SOLID FOODS

The following table is given in order to show the time required for the digestion of the most ordinary articles of food:

*

Di ath´ e sis – A condition of the body which, predisposes it to a particular disease.