The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-08-21
The PIE HABIT.
4onne Comment by a Newspaper in the Pr

sonne Comment by Newspaper in the Pie
Belt.
1t IS quite plausible that his diet is
largely responsible for the New En-
gIander. His crabbedness and obduracv
are the natural consequences of the
Puritan; but three centuries OF pie eat.
ing and cider drinking have unques-
tionably filtered additional verjuice IN
to his blood. There is authority for
the assertion that pie has been a
greater moral and physical bane to
New England than whisky. One may
net be able in support of it to point
out an instance where, after eating
quarter section, a man went home and
killed his wife. The methods of the
pie-eater are slower; he kills with
lingering torment, with marrying day
in and day out the meek, long-suffer-
ing wife. Miss Wilkins has shown in
Pembroke what a pitiless, unrelent-
ing brOw-beaUer a man can make of
himself through Indulgence of the pie
habit. We're il not for his abnormal
appetite for pies-su suggesting to his
fancy that even pies made from the
declare old Cephas impossible, but.
having that appetite, he is wholly
credible. Iron-jawed Deborah Thayer.
whose unrelieved asperity was the
cause of little Ephraim's tragic es-
capade, was likewise a victim of this
New England vice. Miss wilkins has
her undergo poetic but exquisitely Just
punishment, and whether the poor boy
died of his mother'r cruelty or of one
OF her cider-cooked mince pies doesn't
in the least affect the meaning Of the
situation.
Mr.. Kippling is the last to remark
upon the gastronomic depravity of the
New Highlander. He told some one in
London the other day that his Yer
mont home was on the border of the
great pie belt, and when asked lead
ing question about the temper of the
people he now lived among replied,
thoughtfully with: Have you consid-
cred the physiological condition of a
people which eats pie for breakfast. pie
for dinner, pie for supper, and takes
sweetstuffs between whites? Dyspepsia
Is endemic; you can't expect anything
else" Such diet is VIGOROUSLY I'M
healthful. Accompanied by the drink
ing of beverage that turns the Juices
Of human kindness to vinegar, and in
by the climate that "makes
brains more than muscle, and nerves
more than either" and the action of it
all upon constitution singularly irri-
table by inheritance might have been
accurately foretold.
We Rhode Islanders are near the mid.
die of the east boundary of the pie
belt. All New England, all New York
state, part of Pennsylvania, most of
and the country lying be-
tween the northern and southern limits
thus indicated to as far west as the
western boundary of Indiana, comprise
the American pie belt. In the back
counties, especially, do the people
serve pie at the three regular daily
meals, and the children, when they can
by hook or crook, eat it at all times.
Hot doughnuts and cheese are not half |
such luncheon favoriteS. On many an
urban breakfast table the pie still |
holds its own against the restrictions
Of the doctors and the protests of the |
which have to extract from |
1t nOurishment.
Probably Boston consumes more pies |
than any other city in the belt. They
have there the largest pie factories.
We have here-it is not said boastfully |
the little brother of that factory, |
which is tantamount to saying that as
eaters of what Johnson called ''pasty,"
we can not occupy any closer relation
than that to BostOn's full-grown repu-
tation. They have there a pie factory |
that not only stands on patriotic soil,
but one that is located in an old church
building. And thus the shadow of |
Bunker Hill and the shade of Cotton
Mather both help to consecrate this ma
tive form of dessert-Cotton Mather
doing his part upon the under crust,
which is doubtless the essential cause of |
its utter indigestibility. - Providence
Journal.