take food, the observation of the times, often varying, when he is most
faint, the altering seasons of taking food, in order to anticipate and
prevent such times--all this, which requires observation, ingenuity, and
perseverance (and these really constitute the good Nurse), might save
more lives than we wot of.

[Sidenote: Food never to be left by the patient's side.]

To leave the patient's untasted food by his side, from meal to meal, in
hopes that he will eat it in the interval, is simply to prevent him from
taking any food at all. I have known patients literally incapacitated
from taking one article of food after another, by this piece of
ignorance. Let the food come at the right time, and be taken away, eaten
or uneaten, at the right time; but never let a patient have "something
always standing" by him, if you don't wish to disgust him of everything.

On the other hand, I have known a patient's life saved (he was sinking
for want of food) by the simple question, put to him by the doctor, "But
is there no hour when you feel you could eat?" "Oh, yes," he said, "I
could always take something at -- o'clock and -- o'clock." The thing was
tried and succeeded. Patients very seldom, however, can tell this; it is
for you to watch and find it out.

[Sidenote: Patient had better not see more food than his own.]

A patient should, if possible, not see or smell either the food of
others, or a greater amount of food than he himself can consume at one
time, or even hear food talked about or see it in the raw state. I know
of no exception to the above rule. The breaking of it always induces a
greater or less incapacity of taking food.

In hospital wards it is of course impossible to observe all this; and in
single wards, where a patient must be continuously and closely watched,
it is frequently impossible to relieve the attendant, so that his or
her own meals can be taken out of the ward. But it is not the less true
that, in such cases, even where the patient is not himself aware of it,
his possibility of taking food is limited by seeing the attendant eating
meals under his observation. In some cases the sick are aware of it, and
complain. A case where the patient was supposed to be insensible, but
complained as soon as able to speak, is now present to my recollection.

Remember, however, that the extreme punctuality in well-ordered
hospitals, the rule that nothing shall be done in the ward while the
patients are having thei