A handy book on food and diet, in health and disease.

  • Cameron, Charles A.
Date:
1871
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A handy book on food and diet, in health and disease. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    ing to the plant which yields them. Starch when heated to 400® Fahrenheit is converted into British gum, or dextrin; and when heated with dilute sulphuric acid, or mixed with a fermentiscible body, it is soon changed into a sweet sub- stance termed grape sugar, which is identical with that found in fruits and malted corn. There is 15 per cent, of starch (out of the 25 per cent, of solid matter found) in the potato. Rice contains 82, wheat 60, and turnips 5 per cent, of starch; and arrow root, tons les moisy and tapioca are wholly composed of starch and water. There are about a dozen substances termed sugars^ which are nearly identical in composition, and strongly resemble the common (cane) sugar. So.ccharosey cane^ or ordinary sugar, consists of little white transparent crystals ; it occurs abundantly in the sugar cane, beet root, the sugar maple, carrots, pumpkins, and various other plants. Glucosey or grape sugar forms very small cubic crystals ; it is inferior in colour to cane sugar, and possesses less than one-half the sweetening power of the latter. It is found in grapes, figs, and other fruits, and in honey. Lcevulose or fruit sugar is identical in composition with grape sugar, but it is even sweeter than cane sugar. It occurs in sweet fruits, in honey, and in molasses. It does not crystallize. Vegetable muci- lage is found in almost every kind of plant, and largely in flax and other seeds. It resembles gum very closely. Cel- lulose, which forms the cellular, or fundamental tissue of plants, and which in a modified state constitutes common wood, resembles starch in composition, and is convertible into grape sugar by the action of sulphuric acid. Some of the lower animals are able to digest cellulose, but it is not suitable food for man. The pectose bodies, which include pectoscy pectin^ and pectosicy pecticy and metapectic acids are generally diffused throughout the vegetable kingdom. They are most abundant in fleshy fruits, but they constitute