A HARD-WORKING DIET. gI 
. time when they are most abundant, the men give up 
in a degree their employment for the season, and an 
immense amount of palatable and nutritious food is 
thereby annually withheld from the inhabitants of the 
metropolis. 
On the 15th June, 1812, upward of 17,000 mackerel 
were purchased by Mr. Hall at £5 the thousand, and 
sold to the working weavers at the original cost, one 
penny each. They were purchased with great avidity 
—not merely for immediate consumption, but also put 
into small pots with vinegar to keep; they continued 
good for some time and eat like pickled salmon. 
Five hundred thousand mackerel arrived and were 
sold in one day. They were purchased at six and 
even nine for one shilling. They brought down the 
price of meat, as butchers sold at twopence a pound 
under the usual price. 
Improvements in agriculture and economy in the 
use of food are remedies usually prescribed for excess 
of population. There are acres of water around our 
coasts inexhaustible in nutritive and palatable food. 
These fields are perpetually white with harvest, and 
we have only to reap the harvest which Providence 
benignly supplies. 
An objection is made to fish diet for the labouring 
class as being passed lightly by digestion, it is therefore 
unfit to support labour. But, frst, the labouring poor 
in fishing ports who make it their principal diet ave 
stout, hardy and strong. 
