180 



DIET. 



cious interval between the burning day and the 

 breathless night. Natives of the country rarely 

 venture out after dark : a man found in the 

 streets may safely be determined to be either a 

 slave or a thief — probably both. 



Directions for diet are minute and vexatious. 

 The stranger is popularly condemned to 'lodg- 

 ing-house hours ' — breakfast at 9 a.m., dinner at 

 3 p.m., tea at 8 p.m., bed at 10 p.m. He is told 

 also to live temperately but not abstemiously, 

 and never to leave the stomach too long empty. 

 I should prescribe for him, contrary to the usual 

 plan, an abnormal amount of stimulants, port 

 and porter, not claret nor Rhine-wine. It is 

 evident that where appetite is wanting, and 

 where nourishing food is not to be obtained, the 

 ' patient ' must imbibe as much nutriment as he 

 safely can. In these lands a drunkard outlives 

 a water-drinker, despite Theodoret, 'vinumbibere 

 non est malum, sed intemperanter bibere perni- 

 ciosum est ' ; and here Bacchus, even ' Bacchus 

 uncivil,' is still c Bacchus the healer.' As usual 

 old stagers will advise a stranger recovering 

 from fever to strengthen himself with sundry 

 bottles of port, and yet they do not adopt it as a 

 preventive — • experto crede Ricardo.' The said 

 port may be Lisbon wine fortified with cheap 



