DIET IN RELATION TO AGE AND ACTIVITY. 519 



for food, a lighter and more active brain, and a better state of health 

 for most people not engaged on the most laborious employments of 

 active life ; while even for the last named, with due choice of mate- 

 rial, ample sustenance in the proportions named may be supplied. For 

 some inactive, sedentary, and aged persons the small proportion of 

 animal food indicated might be advantageously diminished. I am 

 frequently told by individuals of sixty years and upward that they 

 have no recollection of any previous period since reaching mature age 

 at which they have possessed a keener relish for food than that which 

 they enjoy at least once or twice a day since they have adopted the 

 dietary thus described. Such appetite at all events as has rarely 

 offered itself during years preceding, when the choice of food was con- 

 ventionally limited to the unvarying progression and array of mutton 

 and beef, in joint, chop, and steak, arriving after a strong meat soup, 

 with a possible interlude of fish, and followed by puddings of which 

 the ingredients are chiefly derived from animal sources. The pene- 

 trating odors of meat cookery which announce their presence by escape 

 from the kitchen, and will pervade the air of other rooms in any pri- 

 vate house but a large one, and which are encountered in clubs, restau- 

 rants, and hotels without stint, alone suffice to blunt the inclination 

 for food of one who, returning from daily occupation, fatigued and 

 fastidious, desires food easy of digestion, attractive in appearance, and 

 unassociated with any element of a repulsive character. The light 

 feeder knows nothing of the annoyances described, finds on his table 

 that which is delightful to a palate sensitive to mild impressions, and 

 indisposed to gross and over-powerful ones. After the meal is over, 

 his wit is fresher, his temper more cheerful, and he takes his easy- 

 chair to enjoy fireside talk, and not to sink into a heavy slumber, 

 which on awakening is but exchanged for a sense of discontent or 

 stupidity. 



The doctrine thus briefly and inadequately expounded in this j>aper 

 may probably encounter some opposition and adverse criticism. I am 

 quite content that this should be so. Every proposal which disturbs 

 the current habits of the time, especially when based on long-prevalent 

 custom, infallibly encounters that fate. But of the general truth, and 

 hence of the ultimate reception of the principles I have endeavored to 

 illustrate, there can not be the faintest doubt. And I know that this 

 result, whenever it may be accomplished, will largely diminish the 

 painful affections which unhappily so often appear during the latter 

 moiety of adult life. And having during the last few years widely 

 inculcated such general dietetic principles and practice, with abundant 

 grounds for my growing conviction of their value, it appears to be a 

 duty to call attention to them somewhat more emphatically than in 

 preceding contributions already referred to. In so doing I have ex- 

 pressly limited myself to statements relating to those simple element- 

 ary facts concerning our every-day life which ought to be within the 



