Page:Substance of the Work Entitled Fruits and Farinacea The Proper Food of Man.djvu/25

 informed Mr. Newton "that experience has taught those who have the care of the menagerie that feeding monkeys on flesh renders them gross, and shortens their lives; from which practice they have therefore desisted."

Of the hoolocks (another species of orang and native of the Garrow Hills, in British India) it is said: "Their food, in the wild state, consists (for the most part) of fruits common only to the jungle in this district of country; and they are particularly fond of the seeds and fruits of that sacred tree of India called the peopul-tree." Of one of these it is also stated that, like many of the religious castes of this country, he seemed to entertain an antipathy to an indiscriminate use of animal food, and would not eat of either the flesh of the cow or hog; would sometimes taste a little piece of beef, but never eat of it." He would take fried fish, which he seemed to relish better than almost any other description of animal food, with the exception of chicken; and even this he would eat but very sparingly of, preferring his common diet, bread and milk, with sugar, fruit &c. Of some species of South American simiæ it is incidentally mentioned by Humboldt that they live on fruits; and, indeed, all travellers and naturalists agree in representing the quadramana as naturally frugivorous. All evidence derivable from Comparative Anatomy, therefore, is as demonstrative as we can expect such evidence to be, that the natural dietetic character of man is also frugivorous.

This part of the subject might now be safely left to the unbiassed judgment of all who would seriously reflect upon the evidence produced; but, lest the facts I have advanced should appear to some not sufficiently supported, and (consequently) the inferences I have deduced from them fall to the ground, I shall here add the testimony of men whose scientific acquirements and mental qualifications are universally acknowledged. Not that truth of an abstract and demonstrative nature is rendered any more a truth by the weight of any human authority, or by the sanction of a great name; but because some may be inclined to pay more attention to a much-neglected inquiry when they know that men of great talents have not despised it, and have arrived at a conclusion at variance with the opinion of the generality of mankind. "Such are the scientific attainments, and the general knowledge and integrity of some men," observes, Sylvester Graham, "that their opinion on subjects to which they have given great attention is worthy of high consideration; and when such men are compelled, by the force of irresistible evidence, to come to