44 Fisher — The Effect of Diet on Endurance. 



It is, to sa\' the least, remarkable that hitherto so little effort has 

 been directed toward discovering the factors which explain such 

 differences in endurance. That exercise is one of the most and per- 

 haps the most important factor has alone been recognized. A 

 correspondent assures rae that by means of moderate regular exercise 

 he succeeded in increasing his endurance between 100 and 200^ in 

 three Av^eeks as measured by leg-raising and "dipping." The 

 influence of diet has always been regarded as small or negligible, and 

 the opinion has been almost universal, until recently, that a diet rich 

 ^n protcid promotes endurance. Even among those whose researches 

 have led them to the opposite conclusion, there is very little concep- 

 tion of the extent to which diet is correlated with endurance. Such 

 a person, a medical friend of the writer, stated, when the present 

 experiment was planned, that he did not think the dietetic factor strong 

 enough compared with others to produce any marked effect. We 

 have all heard, of course, of the enthusiastic reports of vegetarians 

 as to their increased endurance, but these we have discounted as 

 exaggerations. The result of the present experiment, however, 

 would seem to indicate that one's im|)roveraent in endurance is usually 

 not less, but greater, than he himself is aware of. Probably it is 

 also true that we may lose a large fraction of our working power 

 before we are distinctly conscious of the fact. 



While the results of the present experiment lean toward " vegeta- 

 rianism," they are only incidentally related to that propaganda. 

 Meat was by no means excluded ; on the contrary, the subjects were 

 urged to eat it if their appetite distinctly preferred it to other foods. 



The sudden and complete exclusion of meat is not always desir- 

 able, unless more skill and knowledge in food matters are employed 

 than most persons possess. On the contrary, disaster has repeatedly, , 

 overtaken many who have made this attempt. Pawlovv has shown 

 that meat is one of the most and perhaps the most "peptogenic" 

 of foods. Whether the stimulus it gives to the stomach is natural, or 

 in the nature of an improper goad or whip, certain it is that stomachs 

 which are accustomed to this daily whip have failed, for a time at 

 least, to act when it was withdrawn. 



Nor is it necessary that meat should be permanently abjured, even 

 when it ceases to become a daily necessity. The safer course, at leasts 

 is to indulge the cravinij whenever one is "meat hungrv," even if, as 

 in many casc'^, this be not oftener than once in several months. The 

 rule of selection employed in the experiment was merely to give the 

 benefit of the doubt to the non-flesh food ; but even a slight preference 

 for flesh foods was to be followed. 



