V.] KEEPING COWS. 81 



strong drink, and never stuffs himself with flesh of 

 any kind. Many and many a day I scarcely taste of 

 meat, and then chiefly at breakfast, and that, too, at 

 an early hour. Milk is the natural food of young 

 people; if it he too rich, skim it again and again till 

 it be not too rich. This is an evil easily cured. If 

 you have now to begin with a family of children, they 

 may not like it at first. But persevere; and the parent 

 who does not do this, having the means in his hands, 

 shamefully neglects his duty. A son who prefers a 

 " devil " and a glass of grog to a hunch of bread and 

 a bowl of cold milk, I regard as a pest ; and for this 

 pest the father has to thank himself. 



137. Before I dismiss this article, let me offer an 

 observation or two to those persons who live in the 

 vicinity of towns, or in towns, and who, though they 

 have large gardens, have "no land to keep a cow" a 

 circumstance which they " exceedingly regret" I 

 have. I dare say, witnessed this case at least a thou- 

 sand times. Now, how much garden ground does it 

 require to supply even a large family with garden 

 vegetables? The market gardeners round the metro- 

 polis of this wen-headed country; round this Wen of 

 all wens ; * round this prodigious and monstrous col- 

 lection of human beings ; these market gardeners have 

 about three hundred thousand families to supply with 

 vegetables, and these they supply well too, and with 

 summer fruits into the bargain. Now, if it demanded 

 ten rods to a family, the whole would demand, all 

 but a fraction, nineteen thousand acres of garden 

 ground. We have only to cast our eyes over what 

 there is to know that there is not a fourth of that quan- 

 tity. A square mile contains, leaving out parts of a 

 hundred, 703 acres of land ; and 19,000 acres occupy 

 more than twenty-two square miles. Are there twenty- 

 two square miles covered with the Wen's market gar- 

 dens ? The very question is absurd. The whole of the 

 market gardens from Brompton to Hammersmith, ex- 

 tending to Battersea Rise on the one side, and to the 

 Bayswater road on the other side, and leaving out 



London 



