Bulk

“ The positive experience of an American surgeon, however, who had an opportunity of witnessing, and experimenting upon, the digestive process through an open wound in the stomach of a patient, has demonstrated that bulk is, in itself, an essential in this process, and that consequently the condensation of the nutritive property of food, involves, in a great measure, a paradox. ”

“ Yet this young man, when weighed with his class at the college, could barely turn one hundred and forty-two pounds in the scale,—not a heavy weight, surely; but some of the middle weights, as the present English champion, for instance, seem to be of a far finer quality of muscle than the bulkier fellows. ”

“ And you, poor deluded victim, are more than half willing to believe that your increasing size is an equivalent to increasing health and strength, especially as your wife emphatically takes that view, and regards your augmenting portliness with approval. Ten years have now passed away since you were forty, and by weight twelve stone and a half a fair proportion for your height and build. Now you turn the scale to one stone more, every ounce of which is fat; extra weight to be carried through all the labors of life. ”

“ According to our best authorities, we are subjected to the weight of fifteen pounds to each square-inch of surface, and a man of ordinary size sustains a pressure on him of some thirty-thousand pounds of air. I am a man of ordinary size, but I no more knew that I laboured under the burden of thirty-thousand pounds than I did that I was subjected to the pressure of about the same burden of Mrs. Cribbage who sits on my shoulders all day and squats on my chest all night, till I turned up the matter in an encyclopædia. ”

“ The normal weight of a man five feet in height is 120 pounds; of a man five feet ten inches, 169 pounds. Now, suppose the latter really weighs 300 pounds by accumulation of fat, what results but that all this superfluous matter has to be supplied with capillaries, and these have to get blood from vessels only constructed to circulate the original quantity? No wonder is it that the circulation is enfeebled and impeded! By this increase of adipose there is no increase of propelling force. ”

“ For instance, if we drop a pound weight a foot on to a scale balance, the work it does is equal to one foot-pound. But if we place it on the scale gently, it will just balance one pound on the other side. ”

“ Perhaps you will wonder how it is that if we have a weight of 15 lbs. pressing on every square inch of our bodies, it does not crush us. And, indeed, it amounts on the whole to a weight of about 15 tons upon the body of a grown man. It would crush us if it were not that there are gases and fluids inside our bodies which press outwards and balance the weight so that we do not feel it at all.
This is why Mr. Glaisher's veins swelled and he grew giddy in thin air. ”

“ Then weighing what they had borne, whether we should find it to be ten or thirty pounds—I cannot guess how much it might be at this distance—one might safely say, without fear of mistake, "The strength of this young lady is equal to ten, twenty, or thirty pounds"—in other words, "she represents a weight of ten, twenty, or thirty pounds" and by a similar plan people have ascertained the strength of the air—that is, the weight which it represents. They have weighed what it is capable of carrying. ”

“ When, for example, we speak of a pound weight on the long end of a lever balancing a ten-pound weight on the short end, it is equally appropriate to speak of the ten-pound weight as balancing the one-pound weight. ”

“ It is easy enough to see why thorough and regular exercise is absolutely necessary to health.
We all know—at least, we all should know—that the general size of the human body depends on muscular development. The same bony frame which makes a slim-jim girl that tips the scales at seventy-five pounds can be padded with good solid flesh until it boasts of a triple chin, fingers like wee roly-poly puddings, and a full 200 pounds in weight. The framework of the body counts little toward size. ”

“ Again, of these twelve men, in less than eight months every one gained perceptibly in height; indeed, there was an average gain of five-twelfths of an inch in height, though all, save one, were over twenty; and one man who gained half an inch was twenty-eight years old, while one twenty-six gained five-eighths of an inch! (Most people suppose they can get no taller after twenty-one.) All increased decidedly in weight—the smallest gain being 5 pounds, the average 10 pounds ”

“ Obviously, then, if you are lifting a pound weight, the actual equivalent of energy expended by the contracting biceps must be twelve pounds. But, in the meantime, when the pound weight in your hand moves through the space of one inch, the muscle has contracted by one-twelfth of an inch; and you may sweep the weight through a distance of two feet by utilizing the two-inch contraction, which represents about the capacity of the muscle. ”

“ Of dry flesh-substance, including a little skin and jelly, there are seventeen pounds, and that is the working part of the frame. It is by its means the ton-weight can be lifted one mile high in a single day, and that all the moving and acting, of whatever kind, are effected. Remember, then, that the acting part of the living body is flesh-substance, and that of that flesh-substance there are not more than seventeen pounds in a full-grown man. ”

“ Hume supposed, that there is a pair of scales, one end of which is in darkness, and you find that a pound weight, or a ten-pound weight, placed upon that end of the scale in the light is raised; have you the right to say that there is an infinite weight on the end in darkness, or are you compelled to say only that there is weight enough on the end in darkness to raise the weight on the end in light? ”

“ Imagine, if you can, a man weighing all of three hundred pounds, not more than five feet ten-and-one-half inches in height and yet of so lithesome a build that he gave not the least sense of either undue weight or lethargy. ”

“ What it comes to is this, that if you have a ten-pound weight and a one-pound weight and you drop them together, the ten-pound weight will fall ten times as quickly. The magnitude of the weight settles how quickly it shall fall. That seems to us so astonishing that we can hardly imagine that any one believed it. ”

“ Again, from the Royal Academy at Woolwich, Professor Maclaren took twenty-one youths whose average age was about eighteen, and in the brief period of four months and a half obtained an average advance of 13⁄4 pounds in weight, of 21⁄2 inches in chest, and of 1 inch on the upper arm; while one fellow, nineteen, and slender at that, gained 8 pounds in weight, and 51⁄4 inches about the chest! Think what a difference that would make in the chest of any man ”

“ When the scholars have learnt to distinguish the pound, ounce, &c., they may come out in turn and weigh various objects.
It would be well to explain that solid objects occupy less room than lighter substances—that a pound of feathers, e.g., would take up a large space, while a pound of lead would go into a very small compass.
Guessing Game.—When the object to be weighed has been chosen, a number of children are allowed to come out and hold it in turn, and say what they think is its weight. ”

“ At five months the length of the body, including head and feet, is from eight to ten inches, and weighs from eight to eleven ounces; at six months the weight is about one pound, and the length is eleven to twelve and a half inches. ”

“ Instead of the weights swaying sideways and banging against the boxes, as they are liable to do in the ordinary old-fashioned pulley-weight boxes, they travel in boxes, A A, between the rods B B. A rubber bed also prevents the weight from making a noise as it strikes the floor, while another capital feature is the arrangement of boxes, in which you may graduate the weight desired by adding little plates of a pound each, instead of the unchanging weight of the old plan. ”

“ While a horse weighing six hundred kilogrammes can hardly support four hundred kilogrammes, or two thirds of his weight, he found May-bugs, weighing a sixth of a gramme, able to support sixty-six times their own weight, or more than ten grammes. Here, then, was a humble and stupid beetle a hundred times as strong in proportion as the proud and sturdy horse. Another little insect, weighing half a decigramme could move a hundred times its weight. ”

“ If steady and vigorous use of one set of muscles gradually increases their size, why should not a similar allowance, distributed to each, do the same for all? See (Appendix V.) what it did in four months and twelve days for Maclaren's pupil of nineteen, whose upper arm not only gained a whole inch and a half (think how that would add to the beauty alone of many a woman's arm, to say nothing of its strength) , and whose chest enlarged five inches and a quarter, but whose weight went up eight pounds! ”

“ Raising dumb-bells above the head, first with the left hand, then with the right, then with both, beginning with bells weighing a pound or two, and each month, with daily practice, adding a pound to the weight until it reaches about one-twentieth the weight of the person, will bring the desired results. ”

“ One hundred and eighty thousand pounds—the weight of twelve hundred average sized men—of fiercely burning, intense virility. Even continuous eating—of his own world's food—could not supply the demands of that body. ”

“ Weight has been defined as the measure of the earth's attraction. A body weighing one pound attracts the earth and is attracted by it with a force of one pound, but the same body at the sun's surface would attract the mass of the sun with a force of twenty-seven pounds, since its weight has been increased twenty-seven times by the sun's attraction. ”

“ To simplify the matter by an illustration, the weight of an animal may be placed at 1,000 pounds, of which each leg, in a normal and healthy condition, supports while at rest 250 pounds. When one of the fore legs is in action, or in the air, and carrying no weight, its 250 pounds share of the weight will be thrown upon its congener, or partner, to sustain. ”

“ The weight is the large body hanging from the short arm of the lever.
What is the power?
The power is the smaller body hanging from the long arm of the lever.
In Fig. 45, the distance from the fulcrum to the power is ten times the distance from the fulcrum to the weight; now, if the small body weighs one pound, how much must the large body weigh, so as to balance it?
The large body must weigh ten pounds.
When the small body weighs ten pounds, how much must the large body weigh, so as to balance it?
The large body must weigh ten times as much, or one hundred pounds. ”

“ If you weighed one hundred and fifty pounds normally, you would suddenly find yourself weighing six hundred pounds more, at seven hundred and fifty pounds altogether. The weight would be so well distributed that you could stand it if you kept your legs firmly braced, but it would be more than a frail chair could endure. ”

“ If now you either pull or push the empty scale downwards, the beam may be brought into the horizontal position again, and the effort required to bring it into the horizontal position will be the greater, the greater the weight of the body in the opposite scale. An ounce in the one scale is easily raised by the pressure of a finger in the other. A pound requires more effort; ten pounds needs putting out the strength of the arm; to raise fifty pounds involves still more exertion; while a couple of hundredweight will not be stirred by the strongest push or pull upon the empty scale. ”

“ A man takes on a heap of weight when he lays off, but at the end of seven months I had the Kid down to one hundred and thirty-four, and I knew that if he was matched up for a weigh-in six hours before the battle, I could steam out at least two pounds. ”

“ If I am carrying a small weight, for example, and the addition of an ounce is required to make the burden perceptibly heavier to me, two ounces will have to be added in order that I may notice a difference when I carry twice the weight, and a whole pound when I carry sixteen times the weight. ”

“ All units must be assumed to be equal in that other respect; and this is never accurately true, for one actual pound weight is not exactly equal to another, nor one measured mile's length to another; a nicer balance, or more accurate measuring instruments, would always detect some difference. ”

“ If, for example, the balance is attached two inches from the fulcrum and the weight twelve inches, the pull on the balance is found to be six times greater than the weight that is being lifted. If other positions are tried, it is found that the power exerted in each case is as many times greater than the weight as the weight-arm is times longer than the power-arm. ”

“ In the same way, there is a great difference in the response of the fingers to weight—a great difference in the ability to distinguish the difference of the weight of objects. It has been found that some people can distinguish differences in weight down to very small fractions of an ounce. ”

“ Divide its weight in grains by the number expressing its specific gravity; extract the cube root of this quotient, and multiply it by 1·9612 for the diameter.
WEIGHT OF A CUBIC FOOT OF THE FOLLOWING MATERIALS,
in pounds.
By means of the foregoing table, the weight of any quantity of the materials specified (in cubic feet) may readily be found.
MOTION, FORCES, &c.
Body is the mass or quantity of matter in any material substance, and it is always proportional to its weight, or gravity, whatever its figure may be. ”

“ Some persons can distinguish, by touch, a difference of half an ounce in a pound weight. Measured by the distance apart at which the points of a divider can be separately felt, the cheek is but half as sensitive as the finger, the finger but half as sensitive as the tongue. ”