Morning journal and courier., 1883-09-24
Life in Germany.
Dinners Which Are on the Whole Worse
 Than DysPepsfa.

Dinners Which Are on the Whole Worse
 Than Dyspepsia.
 Prague Correspondence Medical News
 One misses ice water and our various cool ing appliances very much; 1t is possible, with good deal of trouble, to get glass of water with few pieces of dirty ice in it, but it always seems to excite so much sur prise, alarm and horror in the spectators that ono has to seek out secluded corner of the restaurant to drink it. do not know which they regard as the worst, drinking ice water or eating raw tomatoes. Now, I am very fond of the latter, and always eat them 1 can, but from seeing crowd around my part of the room every day, begin to have some suspicion that the proprietor used me as az advertisement, and that crowds come daily to see the great American tomato eater. Ice water especially seems to be regarded as 8 deadly poison, the cause of all the dyspepsia in America.
 It is fact that we do have more dyspepsia than the people here, but I think it is due rather to the quantity of food we take than to the nature of it. For many reasons the quantity taken here is limited, the chief one being that eeerS Sthing is so badly prepared that no living man could eat what we would call respectable meal then, also, the habit of paying separately for every individual thing one eats even to bread, Is not condu- cive to large appetite.
 The ordinary midday meal here for the better class is about as follows: First, 8 soup which has 8 whole legion of names, which are given to it according as tp whether it contains sausage, potatoes, liver or some other abomination, the body always remain ing beef soup. This soup is, on the whole, not very bad. Next comes the inevitable "RindAeisch, !" the boiled meat from which the soup has been made, dark, dry-looking substance, easily chewed, but as all the salts have gone over to the soup, having absolute ly no taste; it is easily digested, and though not palatable, is perhaps as nourishing as any other meat. Next comes the 'Braten," and glow of satisfaction comes over the face of the diner, for he has eaten his sfRinddeisch" to live, and now lives to eat his "Braten- This consists of baked or more generally fried veal or pork, and is served swimming in gravy and onions. A salad made either of lettuce or cucumbers, which have been soaked in salt water several days'to take tho collie out of them, is generally eaten with this. After this comes the dessert, or 'Mehl- spaise, which may consist of anything in the world, provided we exclude all that is good. With this dinner quart of beer or a pint of wine is generally drank.
 You see by this that the most fertile source of dyspepsia, overlooking the stomach, is practically excluded Possibly another thing which helps to keep the eater braced up is that he eats everything with his knife, and in this way must take not inconsiderable amount of iron into his system. True, dys- pepsia is 8 very uncomfortable and uninter- esting disease, but, even If it were obliged to get dyspepsia from our manner of life, do not know but that it would be preferred to the German dinner. In some of the larger cities, where higher degree of civilization has been reached, as in Vienna and Berlin one can do better,