The Saint Paul globe., 1897-09-27

hopeless consumptive. and declared by
them fortnight earlier than my visit.
as having but ten days or so to live.
When l saw her 1 believed them. and
did not think she would survive thar
night. f7is
Still, I remembered the. doctors
clear instructions, ani his reiterated
statement that consumption is durable
IN all It's stages if only the patient lives
long enough. l doubted her being able
TO swallow the first dose of hot water
L ordered for 6 a. m. the following
morning. felt my responsibility in
confiscating all her drugs was small
She did drink the hot water and all
the m1nutiae prescribed by the New
York doctor were faithfully carried
out. On the second day even, there
was decided change for the better,
and in four days and nights the patho-
logical changes were so extraordinary
and so marked that 1 found myself
astounded, like the patient and her
family. In a fortnight the night
sweats and fever had SO diminished
as to become unimportant.
Nov the patient is safe, if she will
but continue the cure until there Is
perfectly new tissue formed a three
years process probably. She is, how
ever, an hySteric, strongly emotional
and with returning strength is clamor-
new and for vegetable soups. 1t may
prove impossible, unless moved from
her house and temptation, to keep her
strictly to the cure for so long. Heart
Diseases (most of them), cancer, loco
motor ataxia, rheumatism. gout, most
forms of asthma, paralysis, many
forms of lunacy and brain disease are
declared to spring from this same case
of baIeful nourishment bread"
Said we'll known English doctor, who for
private reasons, declined the use of his name
when eonversng with me the other day on
"The fundamental idea of this doctrine Of
diet is that starchy food is mainly digested,
not in the first stomach-I use non-techn!cal
lSnguage-but in the inteStines, and that
such food is for that reason more dificuk OF
digestion, and therefore less healthy. There
are excepdons-for example rice, though pre-
dominantly starchy. is not SO dlf1lGult Of dl.
gestion; but the general rue is as ! have put
it. Apply this principle as to the deleterious-
ness of starchy food to our daily habits. The
chief food which is used daily by al OF us is
bread. Bread contains 80 to 40 per cent OF
starch. If it be true that predominantly
starchy food is unhealthy then bread must
be emiEently so.
'"The case against bread is stated with
great Iucidity and from various points OF
view by Dr. Densmore American writer
on hygiene Bread DR.. Densmore maintains,
increases Indigestion, is potent factor in the
creation of obesity, and hastens old age. Mr.
RoWbotham, who pIacticed medicine in Stock
port in the forties published pamphlet in
1916 which is quoted by DR.. Densmore and
which puts the case against bread more en-
phaticalIy than anything else | have read
''Mr. Rowbotham used in his pamphlet the
phrase earthly matter The solid earthly
matter wrote Mr. Rowbotham which, by
gradual accumulation in the body, brings on
ossifcation rgdty, decrepitude and death
is principally phosphate of lime or bone mat
ter carbonate of lime or common chalk, and
sulpbate of lime or plaster of paris, with.
occasionally, magnesia and other earthly sub
stances
q The only difference, writes Mr.. Row
botham later on, in the body between cd age
and youth, is the greater density, toughness
and rigidity and the greater proportion OF
its composition The definition of earthly
matter being thus understood, the fu1 scope
of the following denunciation of bread by
Mr. Rowbotham will be appreciated. Bread
from wheaton -four, when considered in ref-
erence to the amount of nutritious matter it
contains, may with justice be called the staff
of life; but, in regard to the amount of earthly
matter we may, with equal Justice pro-
nounce it ''the staff of death.
Bread the staff of death'-here, indeed, lis
a statement startling, if not appalling, if
true But is it true? good many people
certainly think so now Some such idea of
the harmfulness OF bread lies at the root OF
ducng obesity and removing Indigestion,
In view of these statements, which have
been selected with the idea OF giving the
concensus of opinion, as well as presenting
known facts, it really seems to the-sun-
preiudiced mind that there must at least be
that has been claimed for it. Therefore this
is the problem which must be decided: Is
bread really the staff of life, or is it rather
the promoter Of death!