have only to repeat that no impartial non-sectarian reader can do other than affirm that my works throughout sustain the necessity for man of a mixed, and not a restricted, diet, and the value of animal food. And of this I shall before closing demonstrate the increased and increasing importance under the augmenting stress of modern life.

But there is a single attempt to meet fairly one argument, which I beg leave to reply to. It is an answer to my statement that 'man is born into the world a consumer of animal food, and it is for the "vegetarian" to show cause for determining at what age, if at any, he should henceforth be compelled to restrict himself to a diet from the vegetable kingdom.' My opponent says frankly, and apparently with some triumphant emphasis, that I have said this,' apparently quite forgetting that precisely the same argument applies to oxen and sheep, which he has called on a previous page "exclusively vegetable feeders," and that no vegetarian advice is required in their case.'

5

Indeed! is not the forgetfulness on his side? Does he forgetor did he never know-that the oxen and sheep being 'exclusively vegetable feeders' necessarily possess a special digestive apparatus destined for future use, when it and the teeth also are sufficiently developed? This does not take place until the end of the first period of life, during which they live entirely and grow rapidly on milk. Then the apparatus comes into use, consisting of four stomachs specially adapted for the digestion of vegetable food, while man has a single stomach, and that adapted only for nitrogenous and not for the starches of cereal foods. He ought to be aware that the 'exclusively vegetable feeder' employs these stomachs for a singular process of digestion known as 'chewing the cud,' which is performed after all meals. Did he never see the herd, reposing after a long and slowly acquired meal of green stuff, lying quietly and happily on the grass, slowly rechewing the mouthfuls brought back from below in balls for the purpose, and afterwards returned into the first of his four stomachs, the paunch, thence to be transmitted in turn to the other stomachs for special treatment there? Is he not aware that the human child never having been provided with such an apparatus possesses a much simpler stomach, closely resembling that of the carnivore, being specially provided with a gastric juice to digest proteid materials, especially those derived from animals, and is wholly incapable of dealing with the food of the ruminating animals just named? For the human stomach cannot even digest bread and starches, which duty is accomplished by the chemical action of the saliva during mastication in the mouth. And should this have been imperfectly accomplished, as often happens, the digestion of the starchy matters is subsequently effected when these have passed the stomach, and meet the pancreatic juice in the first intestine.

Consequently the argument falls to the ground through the 5 See p. 972.

existence of essential difference between the digestive organs of the two animals, the child of man and the young calf, at the end of their respective times of weaning.

No better illustration could have been given of this significant and important physiological fact: that the digestive apparatus of the animal must correspond to the extent of change which its food has to undergo in order to convert it into the flesh which constitutes the animal consuming it.

Thus if grass, which is very low in the scale of vegetable growths, has to be converted into the highly composite animal fibre constituting beef and mutton, a long and complicated apparatus is required-viz. that of the ruminants' above described. No human stomach under any circumstances has the power of effecting the changes in question.

The carnivore, living exclusively on flesh, requires for his purpose nothing more than the digestion and assimilation of animal tissues identical with those already composing his own body. This process compared with that above described is a very simple one; and accordingly the stomach and digestive organs are far less complex in

structure.

Man holds a position between the two extremes, with his varied surroundings and his ability to select and adapt; for he possesses the power to support life by consuming the best products of the vegetable kingdom, and also all animal foods, suitable to his purpose and tastes. The animal fibres of fishes, birds, and tender meat, with the concentrated extracts of the latter, being identical in nature and form with the structures of his own body, are assimilated with far greater ease than the nitrogenous products of the vegetable kingdom. His digestive apparatus is more highly developed than that of the carnivore, but much more closely resembles it than the complicated apparatus of the exclusively vegetable feeder.

Man is therefore manifestly adapted for a mixed diet from the animal and vegetable kingdom, and must be regarded beyond all controversy as adapted for an omnivorous diet.

There is an important aspect of the subject which I desire to present here. It is that offered by a review of the extraordinary changes affecting man in every rank of life and his surroundings in all parts of the civilised world which have taken place during the last sixty years. I am old enough to have marked those changes with an observant eye both in the metropolis and in the country. It is difficult, perhaps impossible, for the present generation to realise the contrast presented in respect of the demand now made on man's activity, especially that of his brain, during, say, the last thirty or forty years with that which was required by the routine of life as it was in the 'thirties.' The wear and tear of existence has enormously increased, and the demand for rapid action and intense exertion by the nervous system is certainly tenfold greater now, to make a

moderate estimate, than it was then. A railway appeared in the first year of the decade named; the penny post and the electric telegraph not until its close; while the press, both daily and weekly, now gigantic, was then by comparison insignificant and diminutive. For the great majority even of business men life was tranquil and leisure plentiful, while competition was almost unknown; I need not attempt to describe what it is now. Such changes have naturally been the cause of permanent injury to many whose powers sufficed for the quiet time, but gave way in large and still increasing number under the inevitable struggle which issues in the survival of the fittest.'

The necessary result of this extreme demand for brain activity, since that organ is the sole source of energy on which all the functions of the body, including that of digestion, depend, is an insufficient supply for this important process. Among all others this inadequacy is perhaps the most common, and it certainly is the most disastrous. As with electrical supply, whether for light or motion, the capacity of the storage cells is limited; and when they are emptied we know that no more work is possible. So with man's store of energy, it must be fatal to his well-being and even to his existence, if digestion loses its due supply of nerve power, since digestion only can refill the storage cells.

Under these circumstances nothing can be more important than to provide food of a kind and in a form which will economise the work of the stomach. It must not be bulky; much of it may be advantageously soluble in form so as to be rapidly and easily assimilated, even pre-digested sometimes; and when solid not requiring much mastication. I have found nothing which fulfils these conditions so completely as the various concentrated extracts of meat which are now so extensively used. When well made they provide the maximum of nourishment with the minimum of demand for labour on the part of the nervous system. And it is worthy of note that several varieties of this form of animal food came into vogue during the middle third of the century, the remarkable demand for them seeming to augment pari passu with man's increased need for support. A happy and natural, although undesigned, relation exists between the two; and I do not hesitate to say that these animal extracts have saved many who might have otherwise fallen in the fray. A teaspoonful of sound beef extract in a breakfast cup of hot water when the brain is fatigued and the stomach unfit for work is often the best antidote possible, reinvigorates the system, and prepares it for a light meal or for a little more work as the case may be-a result far too frequently sought through the pernicious habit of obtaining temporary relief in a glass of wine or spirit.

Nothing approaching in value to well-made animal extracts can be obtained from any vegetable source of proteids. Nothing is derivable from the numerous leguminous seeds, whether beans, peas, or lentils-not even the 'green peas' specially suggested by one of

my critics-which is comparable with extract of meat. I have tried the latest attempt to produce a vegetable extract to compete with those of beef, and I shall refrain from speaking of it further.

Let me just add that the last few years have perhaps somewhat increased my respect for the stomach of an omnivorous animal, and my gratitude for the possession of one. The pace at which we live increases and will inevitably continue to do so, and as inevitably the average brain will increase in capacity to do more work. If I foresee in this a greater demand for strong sustenance, I know well in which natural kingdom we must seek it; not so much, however, in the old form of solid joints which require much more expenditure to digest than the concentrated forms referred to. Also the choicest portions of lean meat may be very finely minced and reduced to a purée, in which condition they may be assimilated by the stomach with great facility.

Let me now before concluding remind my reader that three very important practical questions were formally propounded in the last paragraph of my first article, for which an adequate solution was required.

The first demanded if it would be prudent to provision a large ship, with full crew and passengers for a long voyage, solely on vegetarian diet? Or, secondly, thus to limit the supplies for an army corps sent abroad? Or, thirdly, those of an exploring party designed to investigate a remote and unknown region?

It is significant that at present I have seen no reply.

I also demonstrated that it was at least a fact worthy of serious consideration that the life enjoyed by all animals reared for food, whether in the poultry yards or in the fields, was after all a happy one; and that for no other animals is existence so easy or death so swift and painless. This undeniable statement was simply received with derision! For men who were before all things asserting their humane consideration for animal life, this was at least inconsistent and unseemly; while it failed altogether to meet the argument.

Lastly, I venture to advise my old friends the vegetarians,' as I sincerely believe for their advantage, to change their distinctive appellation. They emphatically state that they no longer rely for their diet on the produce of the vegetable kingdom, differing from those who originally adopted the name at a date by no means remote. I give this merely to fix the period in relation to the name, and to what was assuredly then the practice of vegetarians.

• For further information respecting this indubitable fact, see the work below named, where it is carefully and impartially considered. The tabulated result is given of careful experiments made by Fr. Hofmann on the power of man's digestive organs to assimilate the nitrogenous elements (albumen) from animal and vegetable sources respectively. From the data supplied it appears that while four-fifths of the albumen consumed from animal sources are digested (8) parts in the 100), not quite half (46-6 in the 100) is digested of albumen derived from vegetable sources, cereals, legumes, &c. Food in Health and Disease, by I. Burney Yeo, M.D., F.R.C.P., Phys. to King's College Hospital, &c., &c. (Cassell, 1896), p. 148 et seq.

' Dr. Latham's Dictionary of the English Language, founded on Johnson, 4 vols,

Since that time, and I venture to think very wisely, they have added to their diet some important and nutritious products from the animal kingdom. But they have still drawn a hard and fast line short of using any part of an animal, whether it be fish, fowl, sheep, or ox, in their dietary. Hence they have become simply 'flesh abstainers,' a term which logically and honestly describes their position. But still more recently I have been specifically desired in several quarters to observe as an important fact that a new derivation for the word 'vegetarian' is proposed. And on very high authority I learn that the suggestion is an acceptable one, and further that 'they' (the vegetarians) 'believed in the highest form of life and the highest possibilities for humanity. Such being so, they were not in the category spoken of. Vegetarianism had nothing to do with vegetable eating. It had to do with bringing human nature into greater vitality to a higher position, and to greater strength of body, mind, and soul. Because they believed that eating animals was antagonistic to the higher life, they were vegetarians, not vegetable eaters.' 8

I think that many, if not all, will in time agree with me that with this readiness to repudiate vegetable food, associated as it is with a tendency to cultivate wider aims and views, a gradual further enlargement of the dietary may happily result. For I observe that the term 'vegetarian' is evidently becoming embarrassing to not a few members of the society, as a misleading and inaccurate distinctive appellation is sure to be. But flesh abstainers,' with views thus clearly defined, might possibly not feel bound to deny themselves some moderate use of fish, which would be a valuable addition, since it is commonly regarded as the antithesis of flesh in relation to its dietetic tendencies, &c. Hence its large employment in Catholic countries in place of flesh on all fast-days, as the chief 4to, Longinans, 1870, thus defines 'vegetarian; one who, abstaining from animal food, feeds exclusively on the products of the vegetable kingdom.'

* Presidential Address, The Vegetarian, the 30th of April, 1898.-When my attention was first called to the recent discovery (!) that the Latin word 'vegeto, to arouse or enliven,' having no relation in that language with vegetable life or food, was the root from which the word 'vegetarian' was originally derived, I naturally regarded it as a mere pleasantry. All the world knew what the meaning of the word had been, and that for years it had designated the eating of vegetable food and nothing else (vide note No. 7). If really compelled to take the statement seriously, let me ask what then is the meaning of the emphatic assertions prolonged and reiterated through all the years that are past—of the endless quotations from authority —that the vegetable kingdom contains all the dietetic elements necessary to support a healthy human life? Surely this prime article of faith has been the central and unique cause for the existence of the Vegetarian Society.' Is it not a little late in the day to shift its present well-earned and well-understood position thus ? Both derivations cannot be sustained. Either uphold, as you always have done, the all sufficiency of the vegetable kingdom for man's food, or say at once that you have renounced this doctrine, for vegetarian' has, by virtue of the recent discovery, assumed a totally new and unsuspected significance-viz. the bringing of human nature into greater vitality, &c.' I still hesitate to regard the passage as more than rhetorical ornament, and have therefore relegated these remarks to a foot note.