Hippocrates asserted that most individuals who abstain from food for seven
days, die within that period; or, if they survive this time, and are even
then prevailed upon to eat or drink they still perish. Various instances
of persons who have lived much longer without sustenance have been
observed. In the records of the Tower we find the history of Cicely de
Ridgeway, who was condemned to death for the murder of her husband in the
reign of Edward III., and who remained for forty days without food or
drink. This being ascribed to a miracle, she was of course pardoned. From
the result of this starvation, the story may be considered fabulous for
two reasons: first, from the improbability of the alleged abstinence; and,
secondly, from the selection of forty days, a period clearly fixed upon
for miracle-making, being the exact number of days our Saviour fasted.
We have a better authenticated case in the one mentioned by Dr. Eccles in
the Edinburgh Medical Essays for 1720. The starved person was a beautiful
young lady, about sixteen years of age, who, in consequence of the sudden
death of her father, was thrown into a state of tetanus (lock-jaw) so
violent as to render her incapable of swallowing for two long and distinct
periods,--the first of thirty-four, and the second of fifty-four
days,--during which she neither experienced a sense of hunger nor of
thirst, and when she recovered, she was scarcely reduced in size. Sir
William Hamilton saw a girl, sixteen years of age, who was extricated from
the ruins of a house at Oppido, in which she had remained eleven days: an
infant in her arms, but a few months old, had died on the fourth day, as
the young are not so able to endure abstinence. Dr. Willan attended a
young man who had abstained from any sustenance except a little water
flavoured with orange-juice for sixty days: death ensued a fortnight
after. Fodere mentions some workmen who were extricated alive from a cold
damp cavern, in which they had been immured under a ruin for fourteen
days. Cetois, a physician of Poitiers, relates a still more singular case
of total abstinence in a girl, who, from the age of eleven to that of
fourteen, took no nourishment.
Ann Moore, called the fasting woman of Tutbury, was to a certain extent an
impostor, for although there was no truth in her assertion that she lived
an incredible time without food, yet it appeared evident that her chief,
if not her only support, was tea. That fluid is sufficient to maintain
life appears evident from two papers inserted in the Philosophical
Transactions; one of them giving an account of four men who were compelled
to subsist upon water for twenty-four days, and the other of a young man
who tasted nothing but the same fluid for eighteen years. An imposition
having been suspected, he was shut up in close confinement for twenty days
as a trial, when he uniformly enjoyed good health.
Another wonderful instance of the same kind is that of Janet M'Leod,
published by Dr. M'Kenzie. She was at the time thirty-three years of age,
unmarried, and from the age of fifteen had had various attacks of
epilepsy, which had produced so rigid a lock-jaw that her mouth could
rarely be forced open by any contrivance; she had lost very nearly the
power of speech and deglutition, and with this all desire to eat or drink.
Her lower limbs were retracted towards her body; she was entirely confined
to her bed, slept much, and had periodical discharges of blood from the
lungs, which were chiefly thrown out by the nostrils. During a few
intervals of relaxation, she was prevailed upon with great difficulty to
put a few crumbs of bread comminuted in the hand into her mouth, together
with a little water sucked from her own hand, and, in one or two
instances, a little gruel; but, even in these attempts, almost the whole
was rejected. On two occasions, also, after a total abstinence of many
months, she made signs of wishing to drink some water, which was
immediately procured for her. On the first experiment the whole seemed to
be returned from her mouth, but she was greatly refreshed in having it
rubbed upon her throat. On the second occasion she drank off a pint at
once, but could not be prevailed upon to drink any more, although her
father had now fixed a wedge between her teeth. With these exceptions,
however, she seemed to have passed upwards of four years without either
liquids or solids of any kind, or even an appearance of swallowing; she
lay for the most part like a log of wood, with a pulse scarcely
perceptible from feebleness, but distinct and regular. Her countenance was
clear and pretty fresh; her features neither disfigured nor sunk; her
bosom round and prominent, and her limbs not emaciated. Dr. M'Kenzie
watched her with occasional visits for eight or nine years, at the close
of which period she seemed to be a little improved.
A Dutch girl of the name of Eve Hergen is reported to have lived from the
year 1597 to 1611 with no other support than the scent of flowers. The
magistrates of Meurs suspecting imposition, had her closely watched for
thirteen successive days, without being able to detect any fraud. Over her
picture were affixed some Latin verses, of which the following translation
was given in a book called "An Apologie or Declaration of the Power and
Providence of God, by George Hakewell, 1635:"
This maid of Meurs thirty-six yeares spent,
Fourteen of which she tooke no nourishment;
Thus pale and wan, she sits sad and alone,
A garden's all she loves to looke upon.
According to Pliny, the _Astoni_ had no other food than this Batavian
maiden, being unfortunately born without mouths. Sauvages mentions an
academician of Toulouse who never thirsted, and passed his summers,
notwithstanding the intense heat, without drinking. In most of the
recorded cases of total or nearly total abstinence, water has been found
more or less necessary, but not invariably.
That some animals can thrive upon water, and even upon air, is
demonstrated by naturalists. Snails and chameleons have been known to
exist upon air for years. Garman has found that this nutriment is
sufficient for the support of spiders; and Latreille has confirmed the
experiment by fixing a spider to a piece of cork, and precluding it from
any communication. Every entomologist repeatedly sees insects living in
their cases, although pinned down for an incredible length of time. Mr.
Baker relates that he kept a beetle shut up for three years without any
food. Mr. Bruce kept two cerastes, or horned snakes, in a glass jar for
two years, without any apparent food; he did not observe that they slept
in the winter season, and they cast their skin as usual on the last day of
April.
Rudolphi kept a _Proteus Anguinus_ five years, and Zoys had one for ten
years living on spring water renewed from time to time. Redi found that
birds could sustain the want of food from five to twenty-eight days. A
seal lived out of the water and without nourishment for four weeks. Four
individuals of a large species of larval shell, (_Bulimus_,) from
Valparaiso, were brought to England by Lieut. Graves. They had been packed
up in a box, and enclosed in cotton; two for a space of thirteen, one for
seventeen, and a fourth for upwards of twenty months; but on being exposed
to the warmth of a fire in London, and provided with tepid water and
leaves, they revived and lived for several months in Mr. Loddige's palm
house, till accidentally drowned. Dogs can live without food from
twenty-five to thirty-six days, but man does not easily support starvation
more than a week, except in disease or insanity.
The general effects of long fasting, however, are highly injurious when
not destructive. They are chiefly feelings of great debility, fever,
delirium, violent passion alternating with deep despondency. In general
the temperature of the body falls several degrees, although Currie
observed the contrary in a patient who died of inanition in consequence of
a stricture of the oesophagus; the respiration becomes fetid, the
secretion of the kidneys acrid and burning, and according to Magendie and
Collard bloody, and the stomach is found contracted after death.
Experiments on the duration of life in man and animals deprived of food,
show that the warm-blooded animals are best able to support the want of
food.
But a phenomenon still more wonderful is the faculty that animals have
been known to possess of living when deprived of atmospheric support. A
hog, weighing about one hundred and sixty pounds, was buried in his sty
under thirty feet of the chalk of Dover cliff for one hundred and sixty
days. When dug out, it weighed but forty pounds, and was extremely
emaciated, but clean, and white. The animal had nibbled the wood of the
sty, and eaten some loose chalk. Lizards, especially the Newt, have been
found embedded in chalk-rock, apparently dead, but have reassumed living
action on exposure to the atmosphere. On their detection in this state,
the mouth is usually closed with a glutinous substance so tenaciously,
that they are often suffocated in their efforts to extricate themselves
from confinement. Toads have been repeatedly discovered in a similar
situation, embedded in blocks of stone, or in the very heart of trees. Dr.
Edwards, a learned physiologist in Paris, has ascertained that blocks of
mortar and heaps of sand possess sufficient porosity to admit enough air
to support the life of reptiles; but they all perish if immersed in water
or mercury, when surrounded by an exhausting receiver. The duration of
existence of the amphibials of the Batrachian family, when plunged in
water, depends in a great measure on its temperature. They die speedily if
the water be lower than 32 deg. Fahrenheit, or higher than 108 deg.; and
the longest duration of life is under 32 deg.
How can we account for these anomalies? Various solid substances are known
to proceed from invisible elementary principles. Do water and air contain
them? Metallic stones of large volume fall from the air: how are they
produced? whence come they? How vain and feeble are our pursuits, when the
vanity of science seeks to penetrate into the arcana of nature; searching
and endeavouring to account for the causes of causation! What absurd and
impertinent hypotheses have not been broached on scholastic benches! They
remind us of an anecdote related of the old Parisian Academy, when one of
its sapient members read a voluminous memoir to prove that tides were
provided by the Creator for the purpose of bringing vessels in and out of
harbour; when one of the Encyclopedian wits gravely observed, that he had
no doubt of the fact, since he had discovered, after unceasing and
laborious research, that noses were made for the purpose of wearing
spectacles!
Although total abstinence from food for any length of time, excepting with
hibernating animals, is a wondrous phenomenon, yet it is singular how
little aliment is necessary for the purpose of sustaining life, and even
health. Many instances of a frugality bordering upon starvation are known.
The most economical housekeeper on record was Roger Crabb, the
Buckinghamshire hermit, who allowed himself three farthings a week.
Dr. Gower of Chelmsford had a patient who lived for ten years on a pint of
tea daily, now and then chewing half a dozen raisins and almonds, but
without swallowing them; once a month, by way of a treat, she ate a morsel
of bread the size of a nutmeg.
The late Duke of Portland, after a long illness, during which he was
attended by Dr. Warren, lived on bread and water for six weeks, at the
expiration of which he was allowed _one boiled smelt_. Numerous persons
have been known to live to old age, in perfect health, who never used
animal food or wine; such was Dr. Hecquet, the Sangrado of Lesage, who
published a curious treatise on fasting in Lent: Paris, 1709.
The following lines were written on a man named Offley:
Offley three dishes had of daily roast;
An egg, an apple, and the third a toast.
Most unquestionably, if this Offley was not a man of hard labour, or who
took much exercise, this diet, scanty as it may appear, would have been
quite sufficient to support life, for his fare was sumptuous, compared to
the diet prescribed by St. Theresa to her Carmelite nuns, and which
consisted of one egg, herb-soup, with wormwood ashes and aloes. However,
in regard to the wondrous fasting of various hermits and holy men, we must
take their histories _cum grano salis_. They clearly belonged to two
classes,--enthusiasts or impostors: enthusiasm, which is little short of
lunacy, enables the monomaniac to endure starvation with ease; and as to
impostors, it is probable that, like Friar Tuck they had a _bonne bouche_
in a corner of their cells.