PLEASURES OF STARVATION.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 79, 29 April 1909, Page 4

PLEASURES OF STARVATION.

REJUVENATION BY LONG FASTS.

Berlin. March 7. To prove that complete abstinence from food fo r indelinile periods is not only conducive to good health but also to perennial youth. Miss Claire de Nerval, niece of' Hie famous "fasting" Dr. Tanner, has submitted herself to a remarkable series of experiments at the Roval Charity Hospital in Berlin. Miss Servai Glided at noon on Monday in perfect health a last of ten days without nourishment of any kind, either liquid or solid. During that time she has lived in a glass cage, into which fresh air was pumped by a motor. She was removed from the cage a;id was placed in th ( . ordinary ward, but she intends to abstain from food for another twenty days, living in the meantime on mineral water. Her weight has decreased from 1141b to 1011b, but her condition otherwise is perfectly normal.

Most of the time Miss de Servai ilias communicated with the outer world by means of a telephone, but latterly she has written messages to the medical men who are observing the experiment, and held them to the sides of her glass prison.

(She informed an interviewer that she never once iclt ill from lack of food and drink, and was entirely free from fever or headache. The young lady says that she was induced to become , a "faster" in order to cure herself of chronic headaches and lack of appetite, and also because she finds she emerges rejuvenated after a period of self-im-posed starvation.

Professor Kraus, the celebrated physician, under whose auspices the experiment is taking place, hope* that the results will he of much scientific value.