WHEAT. 733 
But, as Scripture tells us (reverently paraphrasing Saint 
Matthew), “Man shall not live by bread alone,” any more 
profitably than by animal food in excess. The former would 
lead to fatness without a complement of strength, bodily and 
mental; whilst with regard to the latter mistake it may truly 
be said, “that way lies the lunatic asylum.” When poor half- 
starved Oliver Twist, stung to madness by taunts from the 
bullying Noah Claypole about his dead mother, felled that 
craven-spirited charity-boy, and was dragged off to the parish 
beadle by Mrs. Sowerberry. ‘Its not madness, ma’am,” said 
Mr. Bumble, after a few moments of deep meditation, “ its meat ! 
You've overfed him, ma’am!” 
‘For staying the summer diarrhea of infants, and young 
children, it is very efficacious to give wheaten flour properly 
prepared as a cooked ball for scraping. Two or three pounds of 
wheat flour should be tied in a bag of pudding-cloth, and then 
boiled continuously for twelve hours. After doing which let the 
outer crust be removed, so that the dry inner yellow portion can 
be grated, and used for making a thin gruel. This inner dry 
cake consists of dextrin. On the other hand wheaten flour from 
the bruised grain, or as contained in the whole corn, steeped, and 
boiled in the old-fashioned form of frumenty (which is fully 
described in Kitchen Physic) proves excellent against chronic 
constipation of the bowels. This culinary preparation, now 
almost absolete, was very popular in farm-houses a century 
ago. At Weydon Priors’ village fair, Dorset, September, 1829, 
(Lhe Mayor of Casterbridge, Thomas Hardy) was a certain 
refreshment tent among many others which dotted the Down. 
A little iron stove-pipe came out of it at the back, and in front 
appeared the placard ‘‘ Good Furmity Sold Hear.” “A rather 
numerous company appeared within, seated at the long narrow 
tables that ran down the tent at each side. By the upper end 
stood a stove containing a charcoal fire, over which hung a large, 
three-legged crock, sufficiently polished round the rim to show 
that it was made of bell-metal. A haggish creature, of about 
fifty, presided, in a white apron, which, as it threw an air of 
respectability over her, as far as it extended, was made so wide 
as to reach nearly round her waist. She slowly stirred the 
contents of the pot. The dull scrape of her large spoon was 
audible throughout the tent, as she thus kept from burning the 
mixture of corn in the grain, milk, raisins, currants, and what 
