The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1889-04-04
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER ".
FOOD AND DRINK-(continued.)


rality of our earthly ills to the use of animal
food. Not scrofula and biliousness only, but
large variety of moral disorders, he managed
to explain by the influence of our wolfdiet,"
as he called the beefsteaks and mutton-chops of
modern civilization. Imagine Christian
trying to forgive his enemies" said he, and
at the same time gorge himself with flesh
enough to rouse all the savage propensities of a
grizzly bear. Why, we might just as well try
to watch and pray after swallowing a big dose
of opium"
Our physiological constitution is certainly in
no respect that of a carniyorous creature. Has
habit changed that condition? Specifically,
perhaps, but not in any essential respect. To
some degree, indeed, our organism is plastic,
and able to accustom itself to abnormal cir
cumstances. A small breed of sheep on the
Orkney Islands have become accustomed to
exc out an existence by gnawing dried fish,
and without doubt the scantiness of vegetable
nourishment makes the abundance of fish
blessing. With equal certainty we may assume
that the natives of the arctic regions are bene-
flied by their almost exclusively animal diet,
which their appalling climate enables them to
digest But in the Blue Grass region of Ken
lucky only artificial compulsion would induce
a sheep to gnaw fish, and but for the strong
direct and indirect influences of education,
flesh would probably constitute very small
portion of our diet.
Truth, though, is be ter than the most divert
ing sort of exaggeration, and it is undoubtedly
true that the starvation cranks have
ridiculously exaggerated the evil consequences
of carnivOrism," as one of them calls it. The
mistake of the fesh-eater is very different from
that of the dTam-drinker. Alcohol is not only
the worst stuff ever mistaken for an aliment,
but it is considerably worse than nothing at all,
and man left for seven days without food
will have a better chance of survival than one
CHI aft mt IN NOyfl
on brandy.
Flesh, on the contrary, contains many of the
most essential elements of man-food. 1t con-
tains albumen, fat and gelatine; often in the
exact proportions corresponding to the ex-
igencies of the human organism, and the flesh
eaters mistake consists chiefly in choosing
those ingredients in physiologically inconve-
nient form, Our stomach undertakes meat
contract, as a gardener, on persuasion might
60 to work in a slaughter house. Besides,
highly-animalized diet is a severe strain on the
disease resisting faculty of the human organ
ism. Trichina and the germs of tubercuar
consumption may be communicated by the
meat of apparently healthy animals; and there
is no doubt that flesh flood aggravates the peril
of malarious climates.
WINTER DIET.
But in Winter-tim all bat the vilest pork is
preferable to the bread and potato diet that
European workingmen. In that sense flesh
eating America is comparatively well off. The
fact is, we cannot we'll stand a low tempera-
tuTe on diet of exclusively farinaceous food.
Cold weather requires the addition of some
kind of fat-only the fat need not come from
slaughtered animals. Milk cream and butter
in the north and olive oil farther south would
make excellent substitutes. There is, in fact,
no country of the temperate zone, so-called or
often mis-called, where the same course of diet
would be perfectly healthy the year round.
Nature herself gives US plain hint in her way
of dieting the creatures of the wilderness.
Tree-nuts, the principal food of our northern
squirrels are sweet and mealy in Summer but
become oily la the course of the Winter-season.
Fat counteracts cold. The milk of northern
mammals is generally richer than that of their
southern congeners. In Summer many car
nivOrous animals 1.-THE fox, for instance subsst
on a mixed diet-fruit, berries honey and bird
eggs. In Winter the supply of such extras is
reduced to a minimum, and Renard & CO. have
to live almost exclusively on calorifc food.
Our own instincts recommend similar change;
and the Lent of the Christian Church had
originally probably no other meaning; for on
the shores of the Mediterranean, where our re-
ligion originated, warm weather sets in about
a month before Easter.
SUMMER DIET.
Even with our modern habits of indoor life,
a free use of refrigerating food would make
warm weather much more tolerable. 1t is true
that the old world is ahead of us in an abun-
dant supply of the best Summer-diet: fruit,
berries and good grapes; but the chief obstacle
to reform in that respect is our deep-rooted
northland prejudice against cooling beverages
and "raW" food, as if only artificial prepare
ton could make the products of nature quite
fit for the use of man. About 95 per cent. of
our countrymen want their eggs plumb
done'-i. e., boiled hard, and almost wholly
unfit for the purpose of nutrition. Fresh fruit,
fresh air and fresh cold water have to bear the
unjust blame Of nearly all the ills man is heir
to- Consumption is asCribed to cold drafts, "
raw March Winds drink of cold water in
warm weather, cold bath or cold foor-any-
thing but the true cause vitiated air. Drunk
ards and libertines explain their rheumatism
by the caprices of the climate; porkeating
sailors their scurvy by the dampness of the
sea wind. When it was proposed to expurgate
the foul, slum alleys of Madrid the Aldermen
of that city actually objected on the ground
that the smell Of garbage and eXcrements was
needed to mollify the raw winds from the
snow-capped Sierras! During the last yellow
fever epidemic the magistrate of a town in
| northern Alabama prohibited the sale of fish,
! fruit and ice Misunderstanding two of the
| best natural antiseptics for the cause Of their
! trouble During cholera panic the dispense
I tory OF q SDrdSDurg nOSpltal was DeSiegeQ With
| applicants for calomel to "purge the system, "
and l remember the excitement of fat Alsa-
tian matron, dragging a terror-stricken boy
into the presence of the presiding physician
Dose him up, Doctor, quick He's eaten
three raw apples !"
Yet raw fruit is the principal diet of the ma
| tions most remarkable for their immunity from
the malaria of tropical swamp-clmates, while
in conjunction with the influence of pork and
alcohol the swamps even Of the temperate zone
produce their harvest of malignant feyers in
every sultry Summer. The gastric perils of a
fruit-diet are absurdly overrated, while Its
nutritive value is generally moderated. The
/ Turkish carriers the sturdiest men of the
Eastern Continent, are Withal the most frugal
! Pythagoras, Plutarch Leibnitz, Laplace and
Shelley were strict vegetarians. Isaac New.
ton abstained from meat whenever he wanted
to brace his brain for a tussle with abstruse
mathematics. Fruit rice and milk was the
favorite diet of the superhuman Mezzofanti
| whose memory mastered five dead and % liv
ing languages Yet even educated men stick
to the maxim that hard labor and brainworz
require liberal supply of animal food Ben.
jamin Franklin experienced doubt if any
man ever repented of having eaten too little
yet it is still less probable that any inhabitant
of the temperate zone ever regretted the neces
sity that obliged him to confine himself to
frugal diet. We may doubt if all the tree
fruit ever eaten outside of Eden has caused