VEGETABLE OR MIXED DIET.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7696, 19 March 1887, Page 6

VEGETABLE OR MIXED DIET.

The question of preference between animal, vegetable, and mixed foods is constantly recurring, and will probably continue to present itself for a long line to come This ia the more likely, since it is one of -those questions the answers to which will greatly vary in the case of different individuals. Ihe purely animal diet need hardly now be considered, since ifc'is probably unknown in this couutry. The same cannot be said of the vegetarian system. A restaurant recently opened in tho Strand by Messre Spiers and Pond, and another called the " Orange Tree," hear Charing Cross, on the tables of which meat is not found, are sufficent. to testify that London, at all events, is' inclined to give a trial to light fare. There is, undoubtedly, much to be said iv favor of this kind of nourishment. The results of the penny or halfpenny dinner surplied to school children afford proof of ita power to 3ustain and increase in the bothlphy sical and mental strength. Similarly, there are adults whoso constitutions are on the whole bolter 3uited for assimilating herbs or farinaoeaous food than meal. Suob, for example, are tho gouty, who might in many oases restrict themselves to a vegetable ■ diet with much benefit to health. Again, there aro mauy persons ' who ' have no suoh constitutional difficulty to consider, who might with advantage at least reduce their '.daily consumption of animal food. Three or four meals a day at which meat is (aken cannot constitute the rule of wholesome living for anything but a small and active part of civijiaed mankind, though this does not imply "that, a total absence of meat is rather to be advised. For the great majority of healthy, people we should .certainly recommend a mixed diet in preference to any other, though a vegetable meal now and then will afford a change of fare at oucb nutritious and palatable. — Lancet.