1876.] 
The Great Dietetic Reform . 
17 
sustain a considerable loss. The consequence will be that 
he must ask for milk, butter, and cheese prices practically 
prohibitive, and if he cannot obtain these he must abandon 
cattle-keeping, and allow the grazing-lands to go out of 
use. 
But the derangement which would flow from the general 
adoption of vegetarianism would not be restricted to articles 
of diet. There are many well-known substances of great 
economical and industrial importance which we obtain either 
direCtly, by the slaughter of animals, or under circumstances 
which would be greatly modified if such slaughter were 
prohibited. Thus train and cod-liver oils, tallow, hides, and 
hair could scarcely be procured in a consistenily vegetarian 
country. Even wool would undoubtedly become scarce 
and dear if the market for mutton were closed. 
The refuse of the fisheries is rising into importance as a 
manure fully equal to Peruvian guano. But if fish might 
no longer be captured the supply of this fertiliser would be 
cut off, unless, indeed, the destruction of animal life for 
purposes other than food received an exceptional sanction. 
Even then the cost of the raw material would be greatly 
enhanced. There is, finally, another light, in which the 
abandonment of the fisheries would have to be regarded. 
In the past and the present they have afforded maintenance 
to a hardy maritime population, and have been justly consi- 
dered a most valuable school for seamen. Surely it would 
be a mistake to close this school, and to put an end to the 
trade on which that population depends. 
Finding thus little prospeCt of economical advantage 
from the general adoption of the vegetarian system, let us 
turn to a yet more important sphere, and ask — Would the 
rejection of animal diet render man morally better ? We 
have here the opportunity to apply the “ method of varia- 
tions.” If flesh-eating is the main cause — or even one of 
the main causes — of crime and vice, we shall assuredly find 
the criminality of a nation increase in the same proportion 
as the amount of animal food it consumes, other things 
being equal. Now we are bound to admit that other things 
in this case are far from equal. The question is complicated 
by differences of race, religion, and government, to say 
nothing of minor causes. Still a careful examination can 
scarcely fail to disclose the moral influences of diet, if such 
exist. Turning to the extreme north we find the Green- 
landers and Esquimaux, a race who, from the necessities of 
their position, are purely carnivorous. In faCt — with the 
exception of a little scurvy grass, used more as medicine 
VOL. vi. (n.s.) d 
