viii PREFACE. 
if judiciously appointed and skilfully applied. It rests with 
the enlightened physician, and the well-informed housewife, 
to make themselves practically acquainted with these prin- 
ciples for cure, as possessed by foods and beverages which 
can be specially prepared and prescribed for the several 
maladies as they come under management. In which respect 
we likewise in our case advocate a practice of treating the 
sick and the ailing, chiefly with “twa simples,” representative 
of leading kinds, to wit the Cabbage and the Egg. These are 
our laudamy and calamy of to-day, our compendiums of re- 
storative, sedative, and alterative powers and virtues. The 
Cabbage, as Culpeper reminds his readers (1650), “was, for 
Chrysippus his god, and therefore he wrote a whole volume 
about it and its virtues; whilst honest old Cato, as men 
said, made use of no other physick.” In common with its 
vegetable congeners it affords sulphur, a potential antiseptic ; 
‘ also an abundance of mineral salts for tissue-building and 
repair; starches, too, as fuel for the bodily combustion ; 
and volatile aromatic oils in rich plenty, as of special virtues 
for subduing and repelling diseases. Similarly concerning 
the Egg, this is aptly pronounced “the only complete food 
afforded by the animal kingdom, for full sustenance, and 
physical curative benefits.” It comprehends all the alimentary 
substances required for the support and maintenance of 
animal life; contained within its body are proteids for 
structural renovation, arsenic, phosphorus, easy to assimilate, 
an antibilious oil of remarkable energy, fats against wasting 
illness, iron to reanimate the bloodless, and lime salts (largely 
present in the shells) to subserve numerous other reparative 
ends. 
But far be it from our meaning to imply that of comes- 
tibles and drinks, besides the Cabbage, the Egg (and perhaps. 
