—Digestion, therefore, is a dissolving process; food is admitted to the system by means of cells. You remember that all plant food first passes into a soluble state before it can enter the roots and be conveyed to the parts of the plants that require additional food for growth. In the case of plants the entrance is by means of the root hairs. In the case of the animal, entrance in the body is by means of the villi cells that line the intestines. From this we see that digestion is both an intricate and delicate process. Any loss of appetite, any disturbance of the digestion work, and any irregularity of the bowels bear decided results, one way or the other, to the rest of the system; and any disturbance of the body at other points, although having no direct relation to the digestion system, sooner or later affects the digestion and in so doing causes additional trouble.
Directly affecting digestion may be improper food, either liquid or solid; and over-exercise or not enough of it may prove troublesome, for exercise is clearly related to digestion. When the digestion process is disturbed, air or gas may accumulate in the stomach or bowels and give rise to colic or hoven. A watery action of the intestines, due to inflammation or irritation, may lead to dysentery and enteritis; or some obstruction like a hair-ball or a clover fuzzy ball, or the knotting of the intestines, may occur, temporarily or permanently impairing digestion so seriously often as to cause death itself.
CIRCULATION
As water in the plant is the carrier of plant food throughout the plant, so is blood the carrier and distributor of food in the animal. When food is absorbed, it either passes into the lymphatic system or into the capillaries of the blood system. If in the former, it is carried to the thoracic duct, which extends along the spinal column and enters one of the main blood vessels. If collected by the capillary system, it is carried to the portable vein, thence to the liver and finally to the heart, where it meets with the blue blood collected from all parts of the body.
At this point, the blood contains both the nutriment and the waste matter of the body. Before it can be sent through the body again the waste material must be thrown out of the system by means of the lungs. This is accomplished by the heart forcing to the lungs the impure blood with its impurities collected from all parts of the body and also the nutriment collected from the digestive tract.
The chief organs, therefore, of the circulatory system are the blood and lymphatic vessels containing respectively blood and lymph. The only difference between these two materials is in the fact that lymph is blood without the red-blood corpuscles. The body, after all, really depends upon this lymph for nourishment, since it wanders to all parts of the body, surrounds all the cells in all of the tissues and in this way carries to the cells the very kinds of food that they need.
Lymph Passes Through Cell Walls.
—The blood vessels have no openings into the body at all. In this respect the blood system is like the digestive system; it is separate and distinct in itself. The blood, however, does creep through the walls of the blood vessels. In so doing the blood corpuscles are left behind and lymph is the result.
HOW THE BLOOD CIRCULATES THROUGH THE BODY