Page:The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, vol. 1.djvu/73

 that there are millions in India who live upon one pice - i.e., one-third of a penny-a day, and even in a poverty-stricken country like India you cannot get eatable meat for that sum. These poor people have only one meal per day, and that consists of stale bread and salt, a heavily taxed article. But Indian vegetarians and meat-eaters are quite different from English vegetarians and meateaters. Indian meat-eaters, unlike English meat-eaters, do not believe that they will die without meat. So far as my knowledge goes, they (the Indian meat-eaters) do not consider meat a necessity of life but a mere luxury. If they can get their roti, as bread is generally called there, they get on very well without their meat. But look at our English meat-eater; he thinks that he must have his meat. Bread simply helps him to eat meat, while the Indian meat-eater thinks that meat will help him to eat his bread.

I was talking the other day to an English lady on the ethics of diet, and she exclaimed, while I was telling her how even she could easily become a vegetarian, "Say what you will, I must have my meat, I am so fond of it, and am positively sure I cannot live without it." "But, madam," I said, "suppose that you were compelled to live on a strictly vegetable diet, how would you manage then?" "Oh," she said, "don't talk of that. I know I could not be compelled to do so, and if I were I should feel very uncomfortable." Of course, no one can blame the lady for so saying. Society is in such a position for the present that it is impossible for any meat-eater to leave off eating meat without much difficulty.

In the same manner, an Indian vegetarian is quite different from an English one. The former simply abstains from anything that involves the destroying of a life, or a would-be life, and he goes no further. Therefore he does not take eggs, because he thinks that in taking an egg he would kill a would-be life. (I am sorry to say I have been taking eggs for about a month and half.) But he does not hesitate to use milk and butter. He even uses these animal products, as they are called here, on fruit days, which occur every fortnight. On these days he is forbidden wheat, rice, etc., but he can use as much butter and milk as he likes; while, as we know, some of the vegetarians here discard butter and milk, some do away with cooking, and some even try to live on fruits and nuts.

I will now pass to the description of our different foods. I must say that I shall not dwell upon the flesh foods at all, as these, even where they are used, do not form the staple article of food. India is preeminently an agricultural country, and a very large