conclusion. We see the people of the tropics indulging largely in fruit,
which an allwise Providence has placed there and adapted to their wants;
again, at the poles the inhabitants live almost wholly on the fat of
animals--a half-dozen tallow candles being eaten at a meal, when
supplied by strangers. The intense cold requires this heavy fuel to
supply the needed heat and comfort. What would an exclusive vegetable
diet be worth to them, exposed as they are? With us, lying between the
two extremes, with a climate and country abounding in both fruits and
animals, with seasons of cold and heat in nearly equal extremes, it
seems quite rational that a mixed diet, regulated by common-sense rules,
is the best. Certainly the highest civilization to which man has yet
attained is found in the temperate zones, where neither the one nor the
other extreme in diet has obtained.

A manifest advantage and improvement in general health can, however, be
effected by paying a more enlightened regard to those things whereof we
dine. People with gluttonish inclinations can easily and do make
themselves sick while subsisting on an entirely fruit diet; hence, if
discretion is needed in the use of the simplest articles of food, of
course it cannot be dispensed with while indulging in other sorts.

But, in a volume of this character, we cannot amplify the details of
this very interesting and important topic to that extent we could wish.
Suffice it to say, that so far as pork is concerned, we abjure all to
leave it severely alone. There is a variety of other meats great enough,
from which all may choose, and there are no good elements inherent in
pork which cannot be supplied in other meats, or by the free use of good
fresh butter, which is at all times a much better _fuel_ for the system
than pork.