complaints common to childhood.  The youngest child, and the only one who has lived as a fruitarian almost from infancy was certainly undeveloped.  She looked fully two years younger than she was.  Still, there are so many children who are below the average in development, whose dietaries conform to the ordinary standards, that it would be unfair to draw any conclusions until many more such investigations are made.”

The research shows that not only is there need of a revision of the “standard” quantity of proteids, but also of the carbo-hydrates and fats.  It is generally said by those who have no practical experience amongst vegetarians, that the latter require a much larger quantity of food than do those who include flesh.  The truth is that vegetarians eat less, often much less.  It is a common experience that vegetable food has a more staying power, and a much longer period can be allowed between meals, without the inconvenience that a flesh-eater, especially a flesh and alcohol consumer, suffers.  This is due, in part at least, to its less stimulating character and its slower digestion.  This fact has been shown by the success of vegetarians in feats of strength and endurance, and especially in the comparatively fresh condition in which they have finished long walking, cycling, tennis, and other matches.  Those who attempt to prolong their powers of endurance by flesh extracts and stimulating foods and drinks, usually finish in a very exhausted condition.  The superior endurance and recovery from wounds, when compared with our English soldiers, of simple feeding men, such as the Zulus, Turks and Japanese, has often been remarked.  It is often said that vegetable food, as it contains more fibre and is slower of digestion, taxes the bodily organs more.  If we attempted to eat uncooked, the more fibrous vegetables, the grains, and unripe fruit, it would be quite true, but it is not so of the ordinary food of vegetarians.  A slowness of digestion does not necessarily imply a greater strain on the system.  As vegetables, in particular, are for the longest period of time in the intestines, and undergo the greater part of their digestion there, a gentle and slow process of digestion in that organ may be more thorough.  It may also entail less expenditure of nervous energy than if the food had been of such a stimulating character, as to be hurried along the digestive tract.  Digestion is for the most part a chemical process.  If the food is of right kind and quantity, thoroughly masticated, assisted if necessary by cookery, and the digestive ferments are normal, digestion proceeds without any sensible expenditure or energy or consciousness of its accomplishment.  There is nothing improbable in a flesh-eater requiring more food than a simple living vegetarian.  His food contains more proteid, and excrementitious matter or extractives; these stimulate the digestive organs and overtax the excretory ones.  Generally, he is fond of condiments, salt, and elaborate cooking, often also of alcohol; if a man, probably of tobacco.  He lives, as it were, at high pressure.