Savannah courier. (Savannah, Tenn.) 1885-1979, 1889-04-11

position is bad also. When his blood
is pure and his digestion unimpaired,
his affections flow readily and generos-
ity is natural II his nerves are ir-
ritable he is compelled to think OF
himself and is selfish. The best
cure for unpleasant behavior and a
passionate character is a decent diet.
Try IL on your children and see. Love
and tenderness too often leads TO in
dulgence. 1t is thought to be a srall
thing il only the stomach is over
loaded or falsely fed. But it is a very
great matter when we consider that
on the digestion and nutrition depend
also character The foundation for
the use OF stimulants and narcotics,
tobacco and whisky, is often laid in
the earliest years by the irritation
caused by unwholesome food
The amount of food devoured is i'm.
mensely beyond any needs or demands
OF the physical system. Growth and
repair are the two demands in early
life, and repair alone is the require
ment of our later years; and these re-
quire no such engagements of food
as are indulged in by the masses. The
heat OF the body must always be sus-
tained at nearly one hundred degrees.
In summer we have only to combat a
few degrees of lower temperature; but
in winter, by food and. clothing, we
must raise the body heat from zero
outside of us to one hundred degrees
above zero inside of us. 1t plainly
will not do to eat in summer as we do
in winter, as much, or of the same
kind of food-if we consider heat
alone. But in summer we live, as a
rule, more active lives, and pass off
superhuous heat with great ease and
rapidity, while the surface of the body
is cooled by perspiration. Besides,
in winter, we live on the average, far
more sedentary lives, rendering it
much more difficult to get rid of SUI
perhuous food. 1t is probable that
most people digest and assimi-
late and dispose of waste so much
better in the1warm season that they
eat moro than in winter-and ought
to do so. The kind of foods used
should, however, be very unlike. 1t is
almost impossible in summer to eat
too much of ripe fruits, while of meats
very few care to eat in large amounts.
There is remarkable revolution going
on in this matter of diet. Twenty-Five
years ago the consumption of fruit per
capita in the United States could not
have exceeded one-half the present
consumption, for the simple reason
that it was not procurable. The in
creased growth of small fruits is enor-
nous, but the demand is said to fully
keep up with the supply. One of the
most wholesome of all foods is the
grape. The enormous increase in its
cultivation is to be welcomed by all
who desire to see a healthy people. 1t
is one of those fruits that can be in
dulged in almost without limit. A
surfeit of grapes is hardly possible
ty. Thousands of tons are now con-
sumed whore one ton was eaten thirty
years ago.
Rules for diet are as common as
snowAakes. 1t is impossible, how
ever, for one to prescribe absolutely
for another. The physician is never
more severely taxed than when called
on to resuscitate an enfeebled stomach
Vegetarians, Grahamites and a thou
sand other ties have their nostrums
and prescribe with great confidence
The real necessity is to discover some
preventive rather than cure. Some
one has said that dyspepsia is killing
more people than rum. 1t certainly il
undermining the National constitution
and Herewith the National characte
quite as fast as drunkenness, Intem
perance is altogether the same vic,
whether it affects food or drink. Hor
: ace Mann sounded the note OF warnin.
to young men forty years ago in hi
famous lectures. They should be re
printed and re-read. mo glutton OF
dyspeptic can stand up alongside
man with sound stomach and clea
: head. I" !" Nature abhors two things
a vacuum and foul stomach" Who
/ ever fails to eat wisely carries deca
t in his stomach. His breath is tn
: smoke of the charnel house. Ever,
. faculty of mind and every function Q
body are affected, and degeneration i
t the result.
. The most unpleasant feature of thi
7 intemperance of eating is that it
Q quite as easily added to heredity a
D the intemperance of drinking. w
Q have to suffer for the sins of diet {
: our grandfathers. Can the nature
e selfshness of human nature be over
n come sufficiently to reverse thi
# tendency, and make it a law that eac
t generation shall have a little bette
Y chance than the last? II am not mi!
a taken, it can be so reversed and ther
= are pretty sure signs that our nez
Y generation will show the chan gt
s The boys and girls who in ten year
u will constitute the working worl
, will have firmer nerves and better d
II gestion, with more common sens
e habits than we have had.-A
l. Maurice, M. D., in St Louis Glob,
/. Democrat