Sacramento daily record-union., 1890-09-18
Heavy Eating.

There is no doubt that the average
American eats too rapidly. No one who
has witnessed the feats of deglutition per-
formed by commercial travellers at a rail-
way station will cavil at this assertion. 1t
is safe to attribute the national disease of
dyspepsia to this cause fully as much as to
the indigestible viands of which the ordi-
nary citizen makes his chief diet. And
this haste is not confined to the hotel
dining-room or the railway eating houses.
In the private household as astonishing
disgusting exhibitions of rapid gorging
NAV be seen as ever are witnessed in the
public restaurants.
No one who had once beheld the spec
tacle could ever forget the fashion in
which meals are conducted in certain
home where wealth and outward refine
ment gave promise of better things. The
father, man of business from his 10th
year, plainly considered eating the duty to
be accomplished at the table, and quite
ignored such minor considerations as the
interchange of thought or observation, or
any of the social features usually con-
nected with the operation of dining. If
he could not quite equal Napoleon l., who
was said to have devoured his entire din
ner in six minutes, he did not fall far be-
hind the great warrior. Soup, meat vege-
tables, dessert, were swallowed in rapid
succession and in almost utter silence. The
slight delay inseparable from change of
courses was endured impatientIy. Almost
before the last mouthful was down, the
eager man would push back his chair
spring to his feet, and, with muttered
word of farewell, make rush for the
street. In an instant the slam of the
front door would announce that he was on
his way back to his office.
! His children were not backward in imi-
tating him, and all the pleadings of their
refined, csre-worn mother were powerleSs
to check the influence of the fathers ex-
ample. With such rush at meal times
elegant or even tolerably decent table
manners were impossible, and the visitor
in the home found eating a difficult busi.
ness when accompanied by the sight of a
haste and habits that often could only be
described as revolving.
If the midday meal must be hurried
let it also be simple. There is no rhyme
or reason in attempting TO dispose of {
three or four course dinner in thirty Oh
forty minutes. If only half an hour car
be allowed for the repast, let this consis
of two courses only, either soup and ;
meat course, a meat course and salad, ol
a meat course and dessert. These should
be served promptly, but in an orderl,
fashion, and both the conduct of the din
ner and the gastric powers will be bene
fited by such simplicity.
Upon this point the house mother mus
insist. Even if her husband will not con
form to her wishes in this regard, sh
should require from servants and children
certain amount of propriety in servinj
the meal and decorum in its discussion
After seeing that the dinner is punctuall
served, and that the courses follow one an
other promptly, she should herself set tn
example of deliberate eating, and shoul
strive. by the introduction of interestin
subjects, to encourage the pleasant chs
that is potent aid to digestion. 1t wi
cost an effort to do this when she is wear
and harassed by household worries, br
: she will enjoy her own meal more if he
mind is, by any agreeable means, dii
fracted for little while from her cares
, Christine Terhuae Herrick, in Harpa's 81
J ar.