The Eardrum.-on the back of this flap is seeing a strikingly natural representation of the middle ear, the tympanum or drum, as it is frequently called. For the bottom of the tympanum is observed the Eustachian tube, through which is conveyed air from the pharynx to the middle ear. Across this chamber is seen stretched three very tiny, Cingular phones, which, from their shape, or called a hammer, the ample and the states. These delicate bones are connected together, one by ball and socket joint, the other by a hinge joint and by ligaments, and are moved by small muscles; they serve to convey the wave sounds across the tympanum cavity to the internal a year.

There is that crazy word again, tympanum.  In architecture, I believe that refers to an arch or an arch system.  I have a feeling the author looked it up and couldn't stop using it, like some desperately needing addiction treatment repeats a phrase over and over again without any rhyme nor reason.

Additional Articles from the Book of Medicine:

• Spread of Typhoid
  
  

  Spread of Typhoid.  — Sir William Jenner, than whom no higher medical authority could well be quoted, in commenting upon this point, says: the spread of typhoid fever is, if possible, less disputable than the spread of cholera by the same means; solitary cases, outbreaks confined to single houses, to small villages into parts of large towns, cases are isolated it seems from all sources of policy, and epidemics affecting the inhabitants of large though limited localities, have all united to support, either testimony, the truth of the opinion that the admixture of a trace of excrement, but especially of excrement from a typhoid fever patient, with the water supply for drinking purposes, is the most efficient cause of the spread of the disease, and that the diffusion of them lady in a given locality is limited or otherwise, and limited just in proportion as the dwellers in that locality to write their supply of drinking water from polluted sources.

   

  As we transition away from the topic of cholera and further into typhoid fever, it is apparent that the book draws a number of similarities.  Again though we see references to people that are quoted as authorities, however we have no other attribute nation to those people other than their given name.  One hundred years ago, there may have been few people with the name of William Jenner, I suspect that is no longer the case.

• The Intestines
  
  

  The Intestines.  — the next chart shows us the manner in which the intestines are arranged in the abdominal cavity.  The entire intestinal can now is about 30 feet in length, and is divided into two portions — the small intestines, and the large intestines; these again are each subdivided into three different portions.  Of the large intestines, the transfers portion is laid open, showing the internal arrangements.  A section of the bladder is even on this chart.

  _______

  I really don’t have any clue what they’re talking about when they refer to the three portions subdividing both the large and small intestines.  Is nothing in the chart that mentions this subdivision and I’ve never heard of anything like that before in regards to the intestines.  This could be my lame and ignorance or it could be some odd notion espoused in this book.  They also mention that the link to the intestines is approximately 30 feet.  I seem to recall from my grade school education 25 years ago, that the length was 26 feet for the small intestine and six to 7 feet for the large intestine or was that 3 feet for the large intestine?

  My fourth-grade education combined with my loss of memory over 25 years may be getting the best of me.  Maybe I spent too much time at the drive-in watching movies freezing my toes off as I laid on top of the roof of our van, clinging to a van rack.  I’m sure that would seem extremely strange to the writers of this book and possibly even to my readers is not been to a drive-in before during the fall.

• Quantity and Variety of Foods
  
  

  Quantity and Variety of Foods.  — as we have already seen, the human body consists of numerous mechanics or artisans, who are constantly at work repairing and upbuilding the unceasing destruction that is continually going on.  If fresh food be not daily supplied, this work would soon cease, and the lamp of life flicker out.  To replace this constant waste we required nearly 3 pounds of solid food, and fully 3 pounds of liquid food for our daily allowance.  But to convert the pent-up energies of bread, meat and vegetables into the tissues of our own mechanism require a number of differently constructed organs, and these we now desire to draw your attention to this beautiful chart.  The organs consist of the stomach, liver, pancreas and intestines, which comprise the principal organs concerned in the process of digestion.

  – — – — – —

  In 2007 I can hardly imagine what eating 3 pounds of food a day might be like, and I tend to eat a lot having a very high metabolism.  For example I had two waffles for breakfast, two products on hot dog buns for supper and to bananas today.  I think the total of all that food combined may have been a pound for pound and a half if you don’t count the banana peels.  To put it differently, I can’t quite imagine eating six half pound cheeseburgers every day.  Not to mention the half pound cheeseburgers that you get a fast food place like Wendy’s, are weighed before they’re cooked and not after.  So a half pound cheeseburgers going to weigh less when you eat it because they took out some of the crease and fat, but probably not enough.

  Drinking 3 pounds of liquid definitely caught my attention.  There have been many references over the years to the US nutritional food pyramid.  By many accounts the pyramid has been traced to some Washington, DC bureaucrat that came up with a concept that a person needs to drink eight glasses of water every day.  To my knowledge, no one has come up with any scientific basis for why that Washington bureaucrat would chose an eight glasses as opposed to five or 10, or even just stating that a person should drink as often as they are thirsty.  Now I’m curious to learn if 3 pounds of water equates to approximately 8 glasses of water.  This book was published in 1916 and the food pyramid was was written up in the 1930s approximately 14 years later.

  Is it possible that I found an early reference in this medical textbook that may have been the basis for that quackery prescribing eight glasses of water every day?

  It definitely could be possible as this to tomb of a book was definitely reference material that I could envision a bureaucrat pulling off a shelf of the Library of Congress, what better book than the Library of Health to be found in the Library of Congress.  I don’t expect ultimately be accredited with finding the source for that quackery anymore than you or I expect to find a publisher’s clearing House letter in our Mailboxes containing an actual check for $1 million.