166 HOW TO GET A FAKM, 



dime a day in many places, not half that. In many pla 

 ces, though, the negroes do not get half the above rations. 

 We might still further illustrate the principle that the cost 

 of the substances actually necessary for the support of life is 

 small, by reference to the self-imposed abstinence of misers, 

 and the compulsory abstinence of prisoners. 



** An item has been circulating in the newspapers, pur 

 porting to be the result of some experiments made in a 

 prison, where it was found that ten persons gained four 

 pounds of flesh each in two months, eating, for breakfast, 

 eight ounces of oatmeal made into porridge, with a pint of 

 buttermilk for dinner, three pounds of boiled potatoes, with 

 salt; for supper, five ounces of oatmeal porridge, with one 

 pint of buttermilk, which cost two pence three farthings 

 per day. Ten others gained three and a half pounds of 

 flesh, eating six pounds of boiled potatoes daily, taking noth 

 ing with them but salt. Ten others ate the same amount 

 of porridge and buttermilk, with the potatoes, as the first 

 ten, but for dinner had soup ; they lost one and a quarter 

 pounds of flesh each ; and twenty others who had less, 

 diminished in size likewise. From this it would seem that 

 potatoes are better diet than smaller quanties of animal 

 food, at least for persons in confinement. The meat-eaters, 

 if they had been allowed ordinary exercise, might have ex 

 hibited a very different result. 



&quot; A few years ago, a Yankee philosopher of the school of 

 Diogenes, endeavored to ascertain, by actual experiment, 

 how cheaply a man could live ; and his experience he has 

 recorded in a volume entitled Walden; or life in the 

 Woods. Mr. Thoreau, the gentleman referred to, being 

 possessed of a capital of $25, took possession of a few acres 

 of land esteemed worthless, and proceeded to erect a cabin 

 by his own labor. The result of his building operations he 

 gives, as follows : 



