thless, miserable, morbid
characters. A constitution marked by this development is indolent,
relaxative, and an easy prey to epidemics. This treatment is also
characterized by a low grade of vitality or resistance. When life is
sustained by the volitive powers, it is distinguished by a softness of
the bodily tissues, and the prevalence of lymph. The fact that all the
organic functions are performed indolently, indicates lack of vital
power. An excellent illustration of this temperament is found in Fig.
81, which represents a Chinese gentleman of distinction. In the lower
order of animals, as in sponges, absorption is performed by contiguous
cells, which are quite as effortless as in plants. Because of their
organic indolence, sponges are often classed as vegetables. A body
having an atonic or a lymphatic temperament is abundantly supplied with
absorbent organs, which are very sluggish in their operations. In the
lymphatic temperament, there seems to be less constructive energy,
slower elaboration, and greater frugality. Lymph is a colorless or
yellow fluid containing a large proportion of water. It is not so highly
organized as the blood, but resembles it, when that fluid is deprived of
its red corpuscles. In the sanguine temperament, circulation in the
blood-vessels is the most active, in the lacteals next, and in the
lymphatics the least so, but in the lymphatic temperament, this order is
reversed.

[Illustration: Fig. 81.]

Dr. W.B. Powell has observed that a lymphatic man has a large head,
while a fat man has a small one, and also that fat and lymph, are
convertible, one following the other, _i.e.,_ "a repletion consisting of
fat may be removed, and one of lymph may replace it, and _vice versa_."
He could not account for these alternations. The bear goes into his
winter quarters sleek and fat, and comes forth in the spring just as
plump with lymph, but he loses this fat appearance soon after obtaining
food. This simply indicates that, during lymphatic activity, the
digestive organs are comparatively quiescent. But when these are
functionally employed again, lymphatic economy is not required. It is
the duty of the lymphatics to slowly convert the fat by such
transformation, that when it reaches the general circulation, it may
there unite with other organic compounds, the process being aided by
atmospheric nitrogen, introduced during the act of respiration. In this
way it may become changed into those chemically ind