As to
food, for instance, I often think that most common question, How is your
appetite? can only be put because the questioner believes the questioned
has really nothing the matter with him, which is very often the case.
But where there is, the remark holds good which has been made about
sleep. The _same_ answer will often be made as regards a patient who
cannot take two ounces of solid food per diem, and a patient who does
not enjoy five meals a day as much as usual.
Again, the question, How is your appetite? is often put when How is your
digestion? is the question meant. No doubt the two things depend on one
another. But they are quite different. Many a patient can eat, if you
can only "tempt his appetite." The fault lies in your not having got him
the thing that he fancies. But many another patient does not care
between grapes and turnips,--everything is equally distasteful to him.
He would try to eat anything which would do him good; but everything
"makes him worse." The fault here generally lies in the cooking. It is
not his "appetite" which requires "tempting," it is his digestion which
requires sparing.
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