FOOD FOR THINKERS AND WORKERS.

Otago Witness, Issue 1029, 19 August 1871, Page 21

FOOD FOR THINKERS AND WORKERS.

(Phrenuhijicnl Jnvrnal)

Those who expect to think should not eat much food which simply produces warmth and fat, such as ham, fat pork, white bread, butter, rice, tapioca, and starch. These contain very little phospliatic food, being chiefly carbonaceous. Prof. Agassiz says, "fish enters largely into the requisition of the human system. It is a kind of food which refreshes the system, especially after intellectual fatigue. There is no other article of food that supplies the waste of the head so thoroughly aa fish diet. Fish contains phosphorus to a large extent, a chemical element which tho brain requires for growth and life. He would not say that the exclusive use of fish would make a blockhead a wise man, but that the brain woxild not be wanting in one of its essential elements." Man cannot, however, live on fish alone, because most fish are not fat enough to furnish the heat-producing element in sufficient quantity. The amount of phosphatic or brain supporting food contained in the flesh of animals is in proportion to the activity of the animal ; those of great activity, such as the canary bird, for instance, secure food which feeds the brain, nerve, and muscles, but doo& not produce fat. The ilesh of the troxxt, the pickerel, or salmon impart more mental and physical vigour to the eater than the flesh of comparatively dormant fish, like tho eel and flounder. The flesh of wild animals, such as the bison or deer or boar, promote activity in the eater more than the stall-fed ox, sheep, or hog. Wild game generally is considered better food, especially for the convalescent, than the fattened domestic turkey or goose. Barley, oats, and wheat ground without bolting, furnish food for brain ; but lawyers, ministers, students eat the white, superline, or "bolted wheat bread, and go to sleep. That which would fatten a pig, and give him no desire to exercise or to think, is eaten by the learned and refined of the human race, who look in pity upon the poor peasant following the plough, because he is obliged to eat his brown loaf ; which brown loaf and cheap fish and wild game contain the incitement to brain work, in which poems, orations, and art are conceived and nursed. The proper

food for labouring men — wo mean those who have to exercise muscular strength chiefly — should ho that which contains the greatest amount of nitrogen. Among these articles bsuioy and cheese stand high. Tho red ilesh uf the ox or sheep and unbolted bread are the leading articles. Men avlio train prize-lighters seem to understand much better than others how to build up physical strength and endurance. When their battle or race is ended, they lay aside their unbolted bread and fruit, their lean beef and mutton, and fall into their old habits of liquor-drinking and of eating starchbearing articles, such as rice fine bread, pudding, with fat meat and butter, and they soon become as fat and lazy an these carbonaceous articles can make them.