commonest errors into which would-be disciples of food reform so often fall,
and which not unfrequently leads to their abandoning it altogether as a
failure. Nothing is more common than to hear people say most emphatically
that vegetarian diet is no good, for they "have tried it." We usually find
upon enquiry, however, that the "fair trial" which they claim to have given,
consisted of a haphazard and ill-advised course of meals, for a month, a
week, or a few days intermittently, when a meat dinner was from some reason
or other not available. One young lady whom I know, feels entitled to throw
ridicule on the whole thing from the vantage-ground of one day's
experience--nay, part of a day. It being very hot, she could not tackle
roast beef at the early dinner, and resolved with grim heroism to be
"vegetarian" for once. To avoid any very serious risks, however, she
fortified herself as strongly as possible with the other unconsidered
trifles--soup, sweets, curds and cream, strawberries, &c., but despite all
her precautions, by tea-time the aching void became so alarming that the
banished joint was recalled from exile, and being "so famished" she ate more
than she would have done at dinner. Next day she was not feeling well, and
now she and her friends are as unanimous in ascribing her indisposition to
vegetarianism, as in declaring war to the knife--or _with_ the knife
against it evermore.

Now, there are certainly not many who would be so stupid or unreasonable as
to denounce any course of action on the score of one spasmodic attempt, but
there are not a few who are honestly desirous to follow out what they feel
to be a better mode of living, who take it up in such a hasty, ill-advised
way as to ensure failure. It is not enough merely to drop meat, and to
conclude that as there is plenty food of some or any sort, all will be
right, unless it has first been ascertained that it will contain the
essential elements for a nourishing, well-balanced meal. It is not the
quantity, however, which is so likely to be wrong as the proportions and