THE HALL OR PASSAGE
THE HALL OR PASSAGE
OTHER: I once read a book called “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” and in it a story was told of how a lady was once talking with a little negro girl named Topsy.
“Who made you?” she asked the child.
“Nobody, as I knows on. I s’pect I grow’d,” was the answer.
Now we know God made the body-houses we live in, for “it is He that hath made us, and not we ourselves;” yet in one way Topsy was right, for we all “grow’d.” God made us grow, and it is He only that can make anything grow.
Elmer: But we must have food to make us grow.
Mother: Yes, everything that has life must have food of some kind. You remember I told you we had iron, lime, and other things to build the body-house, just as a man must have wood, brick, iron, and glass when he wishes to build. We have looked at the outside of the house we live in, and we have learned some things about its frame, its servants, the telephone system, and the master who lives inside. Now we will look through some of the wonderful rooms in the house, and I am sure you will enjoy learning how they are made, and the work that is done in them.
The door, or entrance, is so small we can not possibly go inside ourselves, so here is a slice of good whole-wheat bread we will send, and I will tell you what it finds within. As it has no tongue, I will speak the words it would say if it could talk, and you may ask any question you wish. Now listen:—
I was made from the wheat that grew in a farmer’s field. After the miller had ground me into flour, your mother made me into a loaf, and I was baked in a hot oven till I was brown all over outside. As she put me away to cool, she said, “That will make the children grow.” She left me alone a whole day, for she knew I was unfit to be eaten while so warm. After that I was cut into slices and made ready to help mend and build up the body-house.
I started on my way to the kitchen, where much of the work is done, and to get there passed through a pair of front doors, which were a pretty red color. These doors, I have been told, can do wonderful things besides opening to let visitors pass in. They can sing, whistle, and talk. They look best when the corners turn up; if they turn down, one does not care to go near them.
Helen: Oh, I see! You mean our lips.
Mother: Yes, I think that is what you call them. When I passed inside the doors, I found a double row of thirty-two servants, all dressed in clean white dresses, waiting for me. Children have only twenty-eight of these servants, I am told. It was their work to make me ready for the kitchen downstairs. If the house is very new, you will find only three or four, or perhaps none at all.
“WHEAT THAT GREW IN A FARMER’S FIELD.”
Percy: The servants must be the teeth. I didn’t know there were so many.
Amy: And I think the bread we eat doesn’t always find them wearing clean white dresses, either. There is Uncle John; his teeth are all stained with nasty tobacco juice.
Mother: But they should be dressed as I have said, and they need careful brushing and washing every day. They should not be used to crack nuts, for they may get broken. If they are not well cared for, the dresses wear out, and great holes can be seen in them. Sometimes they can be mended, and again they cause the master of the house much trouble, and he is obliged to get some one to take them away, because they give him so much pain.
I was quite surprised at the way these servants treated me, though I suppose they knew best what to do. Some of them cut me in two. Others tore me into pieces and ground me till I thought I was passing through another mill. As I had a chance, I looked around, and then I saw the room I was in had a beautiful arched ceiling of a pale pink color.
There was a large servant behind those dressed in white, and he wore a pink uniform. You should have seen the way he rolled me over and over in that room. The servants in white dresses never stirred from where they were standing, but the one wearing the pink uniform jumped from one side of the room to the other, and seemed to be a very lively fellow. I don’t know what he would have done had he not been fastened to the floor. Sometimes, I am told, he peeps out between the folding doors to see what is going on outside, or to tell what kind of work is being done inside. I have heard that sometimes his dress becomes a dirty yellow or brown, and a man with a wise look comes and asks this servant to step outside a moment, till he can see how his uniform looks.
Helen: How funny to think of our teeth and tongue as our servants!
Mother: But that is what they are. There is another group of servants in this passage, called glands. They have little rooms opening into the passage near the floor, and also in the back part of the room. If you ever visited a cave, you remember the walls were wet, and water was dropping from them. You know the skin on the outside of your body feels dry. Some parts of the body have skin inside, but it is wet instead of dry. It is that way in this hall. That which makes it so is called saliva, and it is the duty of the servants called glands to pour saliva over the food as soon as it comes through the front doors, while the tongue rolls it about, and the teeth grind it.
Elmer: But what good does that do?
Mother: It moistens the food and makes it slippery, so it can pass on to the kitchen. Perhaps you know bread is partly made of starch. Another thing the saliva does is to turn starch into sugar, and this makes less work in the kitchen downstairs, as the cook down there has but little to do with starch.
Amy: How may we know when the starch in bread or biscuit is changed to sugar?
Mother: If you let the teeth chew your food a long time, until it becomes well mixed with saliva, you will find that it tastes sweet. This is because the starch has become sugar, though you must not think this kind of sugar is as sweet as the sugar which you buy.
Helen: If the walls in this room moisten the food, why should we drink while eating?
Mother: It is not best to drink much when you eat, and not at all unless your food is very dry. The glands furnish from one to three pints of saliva a day. If you drink much, the saliva is not well mixed with the food, and it is hurried down to the kitchen before the servants have finished their work. This makes extra work for the cook downstairs.