Page:Substance of the Work Entitled Fruits and Farinacea The Proper Food of Man.djvu/45

 and I immediately caused some spruce and oak spars to be shaved up with a drawing knife, and gave the shavings to the stock. All the young cattle and horses, and the mule, ate these shavings greedily, and were very soon improved in their health, and continued to do well the remaining part of the voyage. The mule ate them more freely than any other animal on board, and he improved most; indeed, he was quite plump and sleek when he arrived in port. Some of the older cattle and horses would not eat the shavings, and every one of these died before we got in. About the year 1830," continues Captain Matthews, "returning from Bonavista, one of the Cape de Verde islands, I brought several goats with me. Having no hay on board, I fed them on grain and shavings. They came every day for their shavings, as regularly as they did for their grain, and ate them as greedily."

These observations on the concentrated nature of food are equally applicable to man as to the lower animals. Dr. Stark made many curious and whimsical dietetic experiments on his own person, and fell a sacrifice in the prosecution of his inquiries. The proposed object of his experiments was to prove that a pleasant and varied diet is more conducive to health than a simple one; yet most of the dishes of which he partook were neither natural, simple, nor pleasant, but exceedingly disagreeable compounds of concentrated substances. He began with fine flour—bread and water—from which he proceeded to bread, water, and sugar; then to bread, water, and oil of olives; then to bread, water, and milk. Afterwards he tried bread and water, with roasted goose; then bread and water, with boiled beef; then stewed lean of beef, with gravy; then oil of suet and water; then flour, oil of suet, water, and salt; then flour, water, and salt; then bread and fat bacon; then infusion of tea and sugar; then bread or flour, with honey and an infusion of rosemary. A number of other dishes equally disagreeable, and some of them more so, were successively tried. He commenced in good health and vigour, which gradually declined; and, at the end of nine months, he died, after suffering much uneasiness.

Dr. Stark's experiments prove quite the contrary of what they were designed to establish, and clearly show that concentrated alimentary substances, however varied, are destructive to health and life. This case might be urged, with much propriety, against too great a variety of food, and in favour of simplicity of diet. Even nations on whom science has not yet dawned are aware of the advantage of mixing innutritious substances with highly concentrated food. Thus the Kamschatdales, who are frequently compelled to live on fish-oil, judiciously form it into a paste with sawdust, or the rasped filings of indigenous plants.

Much has been written by physiologists to demonstrate the necessity of variety of food, by which they generally mean a mixture of animal and vegetable substances; and they quote