CHEERFUL MEALS.

Colonist, Volume LIII, Issue 13052, 11 March 1911, Page 4

CHEERFUL MEALS.

It is almost a. commonplace to say that it is not so much what we eat at meal-tiroes that does us good or harm, as th e way we eat it, observes the I<■armors' Union Advocate." Everybody knows that he should eat his iood sloivly, and rwasticato it well, bqeping d.t in the mouth, in fact, till it is saturated through and through with saliva; but how many people actually and .habitually practice this? Not many, to judge by the number of doc tons brass plates one. sees about If proper methods of eating were observed most of thoDo plates would vanish from our midst, their owners' occupation, like Othello's, gone. When food is properly masticated a comparatively small quantity is taken, but it goes as far in nourishing tbe body as the larger quantity taken under wron-r conditions. The remarkable influence of the mind on the digestive organs )s not perhaps widely understood. A prettily arranged table, beautiful flowers, lively, cheerful talk, puts tho mimd unto ,a pleasurable state, and this reacts upon the digestive organs, stimulatinig tihem to increased activity. Hearty laughter, too, stimulates and gives vigour to the digestive function,, ho the moral is—laugh and talk as much as possible at meal-time ■ —it may save you a doctor's bill ' Jhe churlish, selfish habit some people luave of reading , a t meals is an insult to their family, and is bound to bnng its own punishment in time. I■li© cramped position, usually maintaiiK>d us not eoincluci/e to good circu. lation, and bad circulation means the derangement uf the digestive function ; dyspepsia follows, and then—the doctor.

The mind must always co-operate with the body (either consciously o* subconsciously) if the best results arc to accrue. Sandow, di© greatest exponent of physical culture, insists on concentration of th© mind on each exercise as it is being performed. Th 0 mechanical exercise, carried out with the mind fixed on something else is' comparatively valueless. So the man or woman whose mind is concentrated on a book performs the operation of darting quit© mechanically, and sets correspondingly little good from it