Alice. How long does it take the food to digest?
I. Food of a proper kind will digest in a healthy stomach, in four or five hours. It then passes to the intestines.
Ann. But why does it never leave the stomach until thoroughly digested?
I. At the orifice of the stomach, there is a sort of a valve, called pylorus, or door-keeper. Some have supposed that this valve has the power of ascertaining when the food is sufficiently digested, and so allows chyme to pass, while it contracts at the touch of undigested substances.
A. How wonderful!
I. And "how passing wonder He who made us such!"
Alice. No wonder that a poet said—
"Strange that a harp of thousand strings Should keep in tune so long!"
Ann. And no wonder that the Christian bends in lowly adoration and love before such a Creator, and such a Preserver?
E. Now, dear Isabel, will you tell us something more?