286 MEALS MEDICINAL. 
increasing the flow of breast milk with nursing mothers, but 
Dr. Routh gives very much the preference to Conger Eel soup 
in this respect. ‘“‘ Do you know why it is called a Whiting ?”’ 
asked the Gryphon (Alice in Wonderland). ‘“‘I never thought 
about it,” said Alice. ‘‘ Why, it does the boots and shoes,” 
the Gryphon replied very solemnly. ‘ What are your shoes 
done with? I mean what makes them so shiny?” Alice 
looked down at them, and said, “ They’re done with blacking, 
I believe.” ‘Boots and shoes under the sea,’ the Gryphon 
went on to say in a deep voice, “‘ are done with Whiting; now 
you know.” ‘“‘ And what are they made of ?”’ asked Alice in 
a tone of great curiosity. ‘“‘ Soles, and Eels,’ the Gryphon 
replied. ‘ Any Shrimp could have told you that.” ‘ Merlans 
mangés ne restent non plus dans l’estomac, que pendus dla ceinture.” 
Cockles, and Winkles, are popular shell-fish in the poorer 
parts of London, and other cities. As a street scene in a squalid 
South London district on a dismal winter’s Saturday night, at 
the various itinerant stalls for cheap articles of food, we read 
how “‘a pale-faced young woman is poking a Cockle into her 
year-old baby’s mouth with her forefinger, as she tells the 
merchant that the ‘little un tykes to ’em as kindly as ’er dad 
does.’ ”” On another stall hard by are tiny flat fish which suggest 
a minimum of nutriment, lying at a respectful distance from 
more or less fresh, and worn-looking haddocks, the vendor pro- 
claiming the merits of his wares in no modest terms. (Venator, 
in The Complete Angler, has told of those that venture upon the 
sea, and are there shipwrecked, drowned, and left to feed 
haddocks.) “As we presently moralize on the pathetic scene, 
the devoted mother with the infant, who can scarcely have yet 
digested its Cockle, comes again in sight, stops at a small fruit 
stall, purchases a very green apple, and, biting off one half, 
begins to administer the other by easy instalments to the babe, 
perhaps as an antidote to the fish course. No wonder the 
chemist’s shop over the way does a roaring trade; and the 
tall-hatted, frock-coated young doctor, standing on his doorstep, 
looks cheerfully up and down the street awaiting developments.” 
“Turning down a side-street on our homeward journey, we pass 
a provision shop lit up by rows of flaring gas-jets, and with many 
cheap dainties exposed outside. The pious proprietor, not 
content with extolling his butter, eggs, cheese, and bacon on 
three large announcement boards, devotes a fourth, and still 
