34 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



" Flesh-food imparts courage, but also aggressive moods and bad temper, 

 with intervals of gloom and hypochondria ; excessive use of pork can 

 produce a mental nausea, known to the Hungarians as the Tzbmor, which 

 may lead to insanity and suicide. The ichthyophagous tribes of northern 

 Siberia are rendered stupid and sluggish by an exclusive diet of fish. 

 Fish and fowl in moderate quantities and in combination with vegeta- 

 ble food, produce no appreciable injurious effects. The influence of ripe 

 fruit is benign, exhilarating without the eventual reaction that always 

 follows alcoholic excitement. Milk, too, especially the rich milk of sheep, 

 has an assuaging, mildly cheering effect even on hypochondriacs and 

 dyspeptics. Pure fat of any kind exercises a calming influence on ex- 

 cited passions, but if long continued as an article of diet tends to som- 

 nolency and lassitude. Strong cheese operates as a sedative and a 

 check to the activity of the brain-functions makes us stupid in other 

 words, and can also result in a half-physical, half-psychical dejection not 

 dissimilar to the Tzomor. 



" Wheat-bread is neutral, a most excellent though not all-sufficient 

 article of food, and, like a blank sheet of paper, serves as a foil to 

 whatever you may combine it with, while sour rye-bread is a tonic 

 and reacts on the temper in a feeble way. Eggs, raw or soft-boiled, 

 are more nourishing than meat, stimulate muscular activity, and pro- 

 duce reflective rather than vindictive moods. Sugar alone, or prepon- 

 derating in made dishes, causes vague uneasiness in some and mer- 

 riment and wantonness in other constitutions, but moderately com- 

 bined with farinaceous substances and fat, is inferior only to fruit as 

 an alimentary corrective. Potatoes and the legumina (beans, peas, 

 and lentils), inasmuch as they are farinaceous, are a legitimate article 

 of food, yet not as healthy as the cereals. They lack the brain-forming 

 elements, and, though like bread they might sustain life, they would 

 operate depressingly produce weariness and ennui, without the addi- 

 tion of saccharine and sub-acid food. 



" The nervousness and peevishness of our times are chiefly attributa- 

 ble to tea and coffee ; the digestive organs of confirmed coffee-drinkers 

 are in a state of chronic derangement, which reacts on the brain, pro- 

 ducing fretful and lachrymose moods. Fine ladies, addicted to strong 

 coffee, have a characteristic temper which I might describe as a mania 

 for acting the persecuted saint. Chocolate is neutral in its psj'chic 

 effects, and is really the most harmless of our fashionable drinks. The 

 snappish, petulant humor of the Chinese can with certainty be ascribed 

 to their immoderate fondness for tea. Beer is brutalizing, wine im- 

 passions, whisky infuriates, but eventually unmans. 



"Alcoholic drinks combined with a flesh and fat diet totally sub- 

 jugate the moral man unless their influence be counteracted by violent 

 exercise. But with sedentar3' habits they produce those unhappy flesh 

 sponges which may be studied in metropolitan bachelor-halls, but better 

 yet in wealthy convents. The soul that mav still linger in a fat Austrian 



