combination of foods, for we may serve up abundance of good food, well
cooked and perfectly appointed in every way, and yet fail to provide a
satisfactory meal. I would seek to emphasise this fact, because it is so
difficult to realise that we may consume a large amount of food, good in
itself, and yet fail to benefit by it. If we suffer, we blame any departure
from time-honoured orthodoxy, when, perhaps we ought to blame our wrong
conception or working out of certain principles. It is never wise,
therefore, to adopt the reform dietary too hastily, unless one is quite sure
of having mastered the subject, at least in a broad general way; for if the
health of the household suffers simultaneously with the change, we cannot
hope but that this will be held responsible. Other people may have "all the
ills that flesh is heir to" as often as they please. A vegetarian dare
hardly sneeze without having every one down upon him with 'I told you so.'
'That's what comes of no meat.'

A frequent mistake, then, is that of making a wrong selection of foods, or
combining them unsuitably, or in faulty proportions. For example, rice,
barley, pulses, &c., may be, and are, all excellent foods, but they are not
always severally suitable under every possible condition. Rice is one of
the best foods the earth produces, and probably more than half of the
hardest work of the world is done on little else, but those who have been
used to strong soups, roast beef, and plum pudding will take badly with a
sudden change to rice soups, rice savoury, and rice pudding. For one thing,
so convinced are we of the poorness of such food, that we should try to take
far too much, and so have excess of starch. Pulse foods, again,--peas,
beans, lentils--are exceedingly nutritious--far more so than they get credit
for, and in their use it is most usual to heavily overload the system with
excess of nitrogenous matter. One lady told me she understood one had to
take enormous quantities of haricot beans, and she was quite beat to take
_four_ platefuls! 'I can never bear the sight of them since,' she