LECTUKES AND ESSAYS KEAD AT INSTITUTES. 397 



what is going on at the lodge, hall, ball, temperance club, or prayer meeting, 

 may sing : 



" Earth has no sorrows that sleep cannot cure." 



This is item number one, for health at home. Number two has a poetical 



introduction : 



" Oh hours of all hours most blessed upon earth, 



Blessed hours of our dinners! * * * 



We may live without poetry, music, and art; 



We may live without conscience, and live without heart; 



We may live without friends; we may live without books; 



But civilized man cannot live without cooks. 



He may live without books; what is knowledge but grieving? 



He may live without hope; what is hope but deceiving? 



He may live without love; what is passion but pining? 



But where is the man that can live without dining?" 



Energy, happiness, virtue, and religion depend very largely upon the condi- 

 tion of the stomach. Prof. Blot, who, in magazines and lectures, taught how 

 to fry, roast, boil, bake, steam, and eat, was a real missionary of economy, 

 health, temperance, longevity, and home happiness. Dyspepsia converts 

 angels into bull-dogs, and the liver complaint makes seraphs porcupines. 

 Good bread and tight buttons will do a thousand times more for home happi- 

 ness than Latin, literary clubs, and high art, together. 



The intellectual Hazlett wrote his love: *'I never adore yon so much as 

 when sitting down with you to boiled mutton and hot potatoes." What wife 

 doesn't know that the way into the man's heart or pocket is through the 

 stomach ? Good digestion — good deeds. A well-fed man reasons better, 

 loves more warmly, gives more generously, prays more fervently, and is gen- 

 erally more agreeable than a starveling. As a moral institution, then, and a 

 factor in domestic bliss, even so common-place a thing as victuals must be 

 accorded a high place. "Let us eat and drink Avell, lest to-morrow we die." 

 Eating may not be the highest kind of enjoyment. We may not be ready to 

 adopt the sentiment : 



"Better far than arts esthetic, 



Crewel-work and peacock fans, 

 Are these studies diatetic, 



Carried on mid pots and pans. 



This is woman's true position, 



In the kitchen's inmost noolf, 

 And a lady's noblest mission 



Is to cook;" 



but an oyster-stew, or a chicken-pie is a very good thing when well made. 

 Away with the brown-bread and pea soup philosophy of Graham & Co., who 

 condemn all the delicious dishes which tickle the palate. An old Scotch min- 

 ister, after a wretchedly cooked meal, retired gloomily to his study, and, when 

 a brother don>inie called, was found dismally absorbed in his sermon for the 

 next Sunday. 



"And hoo is the warld wi ye to-day?" asked the new comer. 



"Everybody will be dommed," was the gloomy answer. 



"Hech> mon; you'r no weel in the stummich," answered his friend. 

 " Come and sup wi the wife and bairns." 



The minister went and enjoyed a delightful repast. After supper, as he sat 

 over a moderate glass of toddy, his friend asked cheerily : 



"Hoo is it wi ye noo?" 



