The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1892-08-05
TWENTIETH CENTURY FARE.

Extract from Lecture by DR.. j. II. KEEL
logg, of the Battle Creek Sanitarium.
The nutritive value of food material
should be considered in connection with
its digestibility. From this standpoint,
tables of food values with time required
for digestion are useful in determining
what foods are entitled to first rank as
combining rich nutritive qualities with
ease of digestion. A chart made up
from the best authorities on foods-Dr
Letherby, DIR. Parks, DIR. Wilson and
others-shows that the grains and the
ieguminous seeds have nutritive value
varying from 81 to Sc per cent, say an
average of S. per cent. Rice, with its
81 per cent, is the most nourishing Of
all. Contrast with these, lean beef and
lean mutton which have only 2s per
cent. of nutriment, popular opinion to
the contrary Notwithstanding. In other
words, pound of rice, of cornmeal, or
OF beans or peas, equals in value three
pounds of beef or mutton, and four
pounds of f%h. In point of digestibility
the grains and legumes take less time
than meat. 1t is clear then that if one
is to cat for strength he must choose
the grains and lcguminous seeds. The
strong, Woodworking people of the
world are not beef eaters. Although
roast beef and John Bull are associate
terms, yet the English peasants, the
hard working people of England do not
eat much meat.
Some articles Of food are very nour-
ishing and yet their food value is small
for the reason that they are exceedingly
difficult of digestion. Pork, for in
stance, has a nutritive value of 81
per cent, but it requires five hours
and fifteen minutes for digestion. 1t
literally sticks by the ribs" as the
nmberman declares. Rice has a nutri-
tive value OF 81 per cent, and it only
requires one hour for digestion. 1t thus
represents a very high nutritive value
combined with ease of digestion which
gives it first rank as food. The oyster
is very much over-rated as an article of
food. According to Payen, its nutritive
value is less than 20 per cent, and vet
IT requires three and a half hours for
digestion. So that which is ordinarily
termed light diet" is after all, the
most strengthening, and so-called
hearty foods are simply those which
are difficult of digestion. The digestive
organs need time to rest between their
tasks, and if overtaxed by being con-
tinually called upon to struggle with
food difficult of digestion, especially if
taken at frequent and irregular inter-
walls, there will be a breakdown some
day when the only recourse will be
Eight Diet"
With the rapid increase of the human
race, the time must soon come when as
rule a man must eat such food as he
can get most easily and with the least
expense, England is even now, draw
ing upon all the world for her beef and
when America becomes as densely pop
ulated, where will the beef come from
for either country? NJ. de Lesseps was
led to a consideration of this question
by observing that the laborers upon the
SueZ canal were vegetarians. Accord
ing to his figures it requires forty times
as much land to produce given value
of food in the secondhand form of beef
as it does to produce an equivalent
amount of corn. Thus the large area
of grazing land required to raise beef,
makes it necessary in any densely pop
ulated country that the ajority of the
inhabitants shall be vegetarians. am
quite confident that the twentieth CEN
fury bill of fare will be largely COM
posed of fruits, grains and eggs. and
that meat will appear in very small
way indeed. 1t will be the part of wis
dom and economy that this shall be so.
Reported by Helen L. Manning.