Sacramento daily record-union., 1881-03-10
WHEN TO EAT.

Felix L. Oswald is contributing to Pop
uldr Science Monthly series of very inter-
esting articles on diet, in which he fur
nishes some pretty strong arguments
against many of the very generally received
opinions which have heretofore been enter
| tanned in regard to this important subject
! by even the most advanced of the medical
profession. From the last issue we clip the
| following ''Never eat till you have leisure
to digest, for digestion requires leisure !;
we cannot assimilate our food while the
| functional energy of our system is engrossed
by other occupations. After hearty feed,
animals retire to quiet hiding and
| the after dinner laziness, the plea OF our
system for rest, should admonish us to
| initiate their example. The idea that
exercise after dinner promotes di-
! gestion is mischievous fallacy
Jules Virey settled that question by a
cruel but conclusive experiment. He Sc
| lected two ours of the same size, age and
general physique, made them keep a fast.
day and treated them the next morning to
| r square meal of potatoe chips and cubes of
| fat mutton, but, as soon as one of them
had eaten his fill, he made the other stop
too. to make cure that they had both con-
sumed the same quantity. Dog No. l was
then confined in comfortable kennel,
while No. . had to run after the doctors
coach. not at breathless rate of speed,
but at fair, brisk trot, for two hours and
half. As soon as they got home, the
coach-dog and his comrade were slain and
dissected the kennel-dog had completely
digested his meal, while the chips and
cubes in the coach dogs stomach had not
of assimilation had not even be-
gun. Railroad laborers, who bolt their
dinner during a short interval OF hard
work, might as well pass their recess
in a hammock instead of strengthening
them, their dinner will only oppress them,
till it is digested, together with their sup
per, in the cool of the evening. In a
manner essentially similar, mental activity
tends to hinder the digestive process for a
considerable time and | believe, more
especially, the digestion of the very sub
stances that are often selected as BRAIN
food par ercellence. Even after fashion
able dinner of six or seven courses (carses,
DIR. Abernethy used to call them), two
hours of absolute rest will set our wits
a-work again but if that time be passed
behind double-entry ledger, feeling of
lassitude, often combined with an almost
resistless somnolence, will advise the BRAIN
worker that his vital energy is needed for
other purposes. 8 could ca. with more
comfort if it wasn't for the consciousness
of having to hurry back to my drudgery,
heard poor class teacher say, and the
same consciousness embitters the monday
meal of millions of school children and
overworked clerks"
The writer holds that the principal meal
should be last, and that it should be taken
from 4 to 3 o'clock P. NJ, after the days
work is done. We might then have
pheasant conversation, and four blessed
hours for digestion, before retiring for the
night. at is an important rule that we
should digest our food thoroughly before
we replenish the stomach" He thinks
that two meals day are better than three.
We can accustom ourselves to swallow
three, or even six but we cannot compel
nature to digest them between meals
taken so frequently. The Greeks and
Romans, during their prime as nations,
contented themselves with one meal day.
The Gonaque Hottentots are in no way
incommoded by five days fast, and hive
to old age on an average of four meals a
week. Two meals, or one full one and
two half ones, should be enough for any
man the last at night Such custom
will best enable nature to do her work
most perfectly. Eating, like everything
else, depends on training-habit-and In
no other respect is the human system so
plastic as to the influence of habit.
HAMMERS CAscARA SAGRADA BITTERs for habitual