Chapter XXI: Hired Help

It does not seem proper to conclude the present series of articles without touching upon the "servant problem," but I do not pretend to be able to solve it. It is a problem usually very difficult of solution by the homemaker of small means. If she has but few persons to cater for, and is not the mother of a young family, she is often very much better off without hired help, except for a periodical charwoman. But it is not always indispensable to the woman who has other duties besides housekeeping.

I am not here concerned with the housewife who can afford to keep more than one efficient servant. Indeed, I am hardly concerned with one who can employ a really good "general" at from L20 to L25 per annum. The person I am concerned with is the homemaker who can afford at most to employ an inexperienced young girl at from L10 to L14 per annum.

I will draw the worst side of the picture first, for although it _is_ the worst side it is true enough, as so many harassed housewives know.

The young "general" often comes straight from a council school where domestic economy had no place in the curriculum, and from a home in name only. Such an one is usually slatternly and careless in all her ways, has no idea of personal cleanliness, and regards her "mistress" as, more or less, her natural enemy! She is "in service" only under compulsion, and envies those of her schoolmates whose more fortunate circumstances have enabled them to become "young lady" shop assistants, typists and even elementary school teachers. If she had her choice she would prefer labour in a factory to domestic work; but either a factory is not available, or the girl's parents consider "service" more "respectable" in spite of its hardships. Its hardships? Yes, it _is_ its hardships that account for its peculiar unpopularity. For there are hardships connected with domestic service in small households that do not apply to other forms of much harder labour.

Everyone who is familiar with the small lower middle-class household knows how often the life of the little "general" resembles that of an animal rather than a human being. All day long she drudges in a muddling, inefficient way, continually scolded for her inefficiency yet never really taught how to do anything properly. Her work is never done, for she is always at the beck and call of her employers; yet she lives apart in social isolation, is referred to contemptuously as the "slavey," and even her food is dispensed to her grudgingly and minus the special dainties bought for Sundays and holidays. This is domestic service at its worst, of course, but the prevalence of such "places" in actual fact is undoubtedly at the root of the young girl's objection to it. How can she help gleaning the impression that such work is "menial," when her employers more or less openly despise her? Being human, how can she but envy those of her old friends who have their evenings to themselves? What contentment can she find in a life of drudgery unenlightened by intelligent interest in learning how to do something well? What wonder that all her hopes and ambitions become centred in the possession of a "young man," and that reason--stunted from its birth for lack of room to grow--being entirely absent from her choice, she marries badly and too young, and becomes the mother of a numerous progeny as helpless, hopeless, stunted and inefficient as herself?

Some conscientious women try to remedy this state of things by treating the girls they take into their homes as "one of the family." This _may_ answer well sometimes, but it has its drawbacks, both for the girl and the "family." Husband and wife, brother and sister, inevitably find the constant presence of a stranger with whom they have little in common very irksome. While the girl herself is equally conscious of restraint when forced to spend her leisure time with her employers. She would usually infinitely prefer the solitude of the kitchen, if combined with a good fire, a comfortable chair and a story book.

Among the girls I have spoken to on the subject I have not found "socialist" households popular. One girl I met refused to stay in such a place for longer than three days, because she "never had the kitchen to herself." Another told me that she found it intensely boring to take meals with the family, because she was not interested in the things they talked about.

I think that the ultimate solution of the "servant problem" will not be that every woman will do all her own housework, but that domestic work will become, on the one hand, very much simplified and, on the other, will be put on the same footing as teaching, nursing or secretarial work. That we are beginning to move in this direction is evidenced by the coming into existence of schools of domestic economy, to which "ladies" do not disdain to resort for training. This will undoubtedly result in domestic labour becoming a much higher-priced commodity than it is now, the housewife will have to pay at least as much for three hours help per day as she now does for nine hours, but the fact that the help will be skilled, combined with the greater simplicity of housework, will surely more than compensate for this.

But what is the homemaker of limited means, who must have some help, to do under present conditions? This we must consider next month.

FLORENCE DANIEL.

HEALTH QUERIES.

_Under this heading Dr Knaggs deals briefly month by month, and according as space permits, with questions of general interest._

_Correspondents are earnestly requested to write on one side only of the paper, giving full name and address, not for publication, but as a guarantee of good faith. When an answer is required by post a stamped addressed envelope must be enclosed._--[EDS.]

BOILS: THEIR CAUSE AND CURE.

Miss L.C. writes:--I should be deeply indebted to you if you
would advise me in the following matter. I have been suffering
from a recurrence of boils on different parts of my body during
the last six months. I have consulted a local doctor, but he can
find no reason for their appearance, but suggested I should try a
mixed diet, to include some animal food, rather than adhere to
vegetarianism as I have done for some two years past.

My diet is about as follows:--

_On rising._--Tumblerful of hot water.

_Breakfast_ (eight o'clock).--One egg, toasted bread (wholemeal)
and butter, with either a little lettuce or marmalade and either
weak tea or cocoa.

_Lunch_ (one o'clock).--Steamed green or root vegetable, with
cheese sauce or macaroni cheese or similar savoury, or nuts.
Boiled or baked pudding or stewed fruit with custard or blanc
mange.

_Tea_ (four o'clock).--Tea or cocoa, with or without a little
bread and butter and cake.

_Supper_ (7 o'clock).--Vegetable soup, milk pudding and a little
cheese, butter and salad and wholemeal bread.

I am forty-nine years of age, lead a fairly active life,
frequently taking walking exercise. I am very tall and weigh
twelve stone. Have had no serious illness, but been more or less
anaemic all my life.

If you can tell me whether there is anything wrong in connection
with my diet and suggest the cause of, and treatment for, the
boils I shall be exceedingly obliged.

In order to help this correspondent to permanently get rid of these boils, we must first ascertain what those troublesome manifestations are and look to the causes which produce them.

A boil is a small, tense, painful, inflammatory swelling appearing in or upon the skin, and is due to the local death or gangrene of a small portion of the skin's surface. This eventually comes away in the form of a core, and, until this has cleared away, the boil will not heal or cease to be painful.

Boils occur chiefly on the neck, arms or buttocks. If very large they are known as carbuncles, and if they occur on the fingers or toes they are described as whitlows. It is often the friction of a frayed-out collar or cuff, of tight waist clothing, or, in the case of whitlows, the introduction of some irritant or poison between the nail and the skin that determines the precise site at which they will come.

Boils, although rarely dangerous to life, are usually accompanied by pain severe out of all proportion to the extent of surface involved. This gives rise to much broken rest and loss of vitality, which at once ceases when the boil has finished its course. Boils usually occur in series or crops.

Now large numbers of people wear collars and cuffs with frayed edges, or handle irritants with their fingers, but they do not necessarily contract boils or whitlows. Therefore, we see that there must be other factors to be taken into consideration to account for their presence. The orthodox germ-loving practitioner may tell you that a boil is a purely local disorder and that a certain form of microbe, known as the _Staphylococcus pyogenes_, is the cause of it. This germ, he asserts, lives normally on the surface of the skin and, when this surface becomes broken, it enters the part and infects it, thereby starting the boil.

If this is true every person who wears old collars or dabbles his hands in dirt should without exception contract boils. This is obviously untrue.

The factor to be considered, then, is this. What is it that induces boils in one person and not in another under identical circumstances? The answer is obvious. The boil is not a local disease at all, but is a manifestation of some constitutional defect, or of some impurity of the blood stream, which enables this microbe to find a congenial breeding ground.

The people who suffer most from boils are young or middle-aged adults, and we usually find the two extremes among sufferers. There is the full-blooded, often overfed, individual and there is the pale, debilitated and emaciated person whose constitution is broken down by worry, overwork, sexual troubles, unhealthy surroundings or badly selected foods.

If we inquire into the constitutional history of these cases we shall almost invariably discover that the digestive or assimilative processes of the body are not working smoothly. This may be due to the worry or overwork, or to unhealthy surroundings which dis-harmonise the digestive and nutritive functions, or to nervous exhaustion from one cause or another, or it may be due to the wrong diet, which is filling the colon (or large bowel) with fermenting poisons.

When the body is clogged in this manner nature often proceeds to get rid of the accumulating waste through the skin. By a vigorous effort on the part of the life-force the impurity is thrown outwards to the surface. Looked at in this light a boil is really a most salutary cleansing agent, and the Nature-Cure practitioner, who calls it a "Crisis," often does everything in his power to produce boils when treating chronic diseases.

The alternative is often some more deeply seated form of elimination, resulting in serious organic disease of the organs or tissues. One of the first signs of improvement in disorders like diabetes, consumption, arthritis, Bright's disease, or even cancer, is the appearance of boils, showing that the vitality has improved to an extent sufficient to enable the foreign matter to be expelled by means of relatively harmless boils. The hydropathic expert also tries to induce this condition by means of his mustard and water packs.

If our correspondent wants to rid herself of her boils she must adopt all means to improve her vitality and to cleanse her body of its impurities. She can do this along many lines. She can take a holiday and rest from her work; or by positive thinking she can set to work to get rid of her worries. She can learn to laugh as often as possible, and to breathe deeply, slowly and fully. If her house is unsanitary she should make it sanitary, or move elsewhere.

Then she must restrict her diet and take only those forms of food which create a minimum amount of poison in the system. _She must cleanse the colon daily_ with warm water enemas, and encourage the action of the kidneys in doing their rightful part in the elimination of poisons by the drinking of distilled water or a good herbal tea on rising, and of clear vegetable broth at night.

Clay packs, applied cold, are the best form of treatment for application to the boils themselves. They should never be cut or squeezed, as this only intensifies the trouble. Hot applications, as poultices, are bad, because they induce the boil to mature prematurely, and also are conducive to reinfection of the skin in other parts. Drugs or medicines are of very little use in the treatment of boils, because they do not go to the root of the trouble. The only remedy that I have found of any avail is yeast. In former times this was taken in the form of fresh or dried brewers' yeast, and it was, if unpleasant, a very effectual remedy. Yeast yields a free supply of what is called nuclein and nucleinic acid. These, chemically, are identical with the same substances found in the human cells. Nuclein is a powerful antiseptic. It has been found that the toxins or emanations from diphtheria and other deadly germs are precipitated and destroyed by nucleinic acid.

It is for this reason that yeast extracts, such as Marmite, often have a beneficial effect in disorders accompanied by the formation of pus matter.

Our correspondent's diet should be amended as follows:--

_On rising._--A cupful of unseasoned Marmite.

_Breakfast._--One scrambled or lightly poached egg with stale, yeast-made, wholemeal bread and nut butter, with lettuce or other salad food. No marmalade; no tea or coffee.

_Lunch._--1 to 2 oz. of grated cheese or flaked pine kernels, finely shredded raw cabbage, or grated radishes, or grated raw roots with oil and lemon dressing. No cooked savouries, no puddings, nor stewed fruit with custard or blanc mange should be taken.

_Tea Meal._--Cupful of Marmite, only.

_Supper._--Clear, unseasoned, vegetable broth, with Veda or wholemeal bread, or Granose biscuits, with nut butter and some fresh fruit.

_At bedtime._--A cupful of Marmite.

NOTE.--The unseasoned Marmite should be used, as the ordinary kind is rather heavily salted.

A BAD CASE OF SELF-POISONING.

Mrs H.W. writes:--I should be very glad if you would give me
enlightenment on one or two points about my diet. I am suffering
from a somewhat dilated stomach, also a catarrhal condition of
nose, throat and alimentary canal, with constipation and much
flatulence in the bowels. My teeth are decaying quickly, my nails
have got softer, and I have become anaemic and generally
debilitated, being unable to properly assimilate my food. All my
joints crack when moved, and the knee joints creak as well. Is
this a uric acid condition, or do you think it merely due to a
lack of nourishment, causing a lack of synovial fluid? The joints
are not swollen and not painful, they merely crack. My whole
system seems to be over-acid, and my mouth gets sore and
ulcerated. I have got very thin, having lost a stone in twelve
months.

I notice that you always advise for dilated stomach greatly
restricting the liquid part of the diet. Will you tell me just
how much one _may_ drink in a day, because when I go without
drinking my constipation and other troubles are worse and the
urine gets thick and muddy.

You also deprecate milk. This puzzled me until you explained to a
correspondent last month in _The Healthy Life_. Will you tell me
if the same applies to dried milk--will it tend to increase
intestinal trouble? I am anxious to know this because I have been
relying somewhat on Emprote and Hygiama lately, for I had got so
that I could scarcely digest anything.

Do you consider it better to use the enema than to take a mild
aperient? I do not want to start with the enema again if I can
possibly manage to do without, because I found that my bowels
depended upon it. And that is why I want to ask if it is
absolutely necessary when on an antiseptic diet to entirely avoid
fruit. I find it so necessary to keep the bowels working
naturally.

I _do_ want you to answer me these questions, because I have got
so worried and fearful (people's theories are so varied) that I
scarcely dare eat any food at all. I am at present taking only
two meals daily (I like the two-meal plan best): at eleven A.M.
and 6 P.M. I take a cup of weak coffee on rising, without milk or
sugar--this warm drink seems to start the peristaltic action and
I then get bowel action. I think of changing the coffee for Sanum
Tonic Tea or Dandelion Coffee.

At eleven o'clock I have an egg with Winter's "Maltweat" bread
and almond butter, and some conservatively cooked vegetable
(celery or carrot or spinach).

At six P.M. I have one or two baked apples, a teaspoonful or two
of malted nuts, or Emprote, and more "Maltweat" bread and butter.

At four P.M. I take a cup of barley water or carrot water, and at
bedtime another cup of barley water.

Do you think that if I went on to a milk diet for a time it would
do good?

This correspondent seems to be suffering from auto-toxaemia, or self-poisoning in a severe form, and a condition of what is termed arterio-sclerosis or premature old age. Associated with it are evidently symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis, which is affecting her joints and teeth. It is not one of ordinary gout or uric acid poisoning. The trouble no doubt has been caused by past errors of diet, so that the present efforts at reform have come too late to be of service to her. Something more than diet is now needed to clear the acids and toxins from the system. It is not a simple case of digestive catarrh, for the whole body is affected. The present diet will answer very well as it stands.

The first thing to do is to obtain a well-fitting dilatation belt. This must have leg straps and firmly support the lower half of the abdomen. The next thing is to promote skin action so as to encourage the clearing out of poisons along this line of elimination. Vapour baths, wet-sheet packs or alkaline hot baths can effect this purpose. An alkaline hot bath should be of a temperature of 105 degrees Fahr. or more, and to the bath should be added 1/4 lb. of bicarbonate of soda and 1/4 lb. packet of "Robin" starch. She should remain as long as possible in this so as to well clear the acids from the skin and induce as much skin action or perspiration as possible. The _first_ baths must be of very short duration, and she should be careful to avoid chill after the bath; it is best to lie prone and completely relaxed for half-an-hour at least after the bath. Finally massage and Swedish movements directed to the entire back will help to disencumber the central nervous system, which is evidently very badly depleted of its vital force. It is, of course, a pity the correspondent cannot get away to a properly organised Nature-Cure home and have the continuous attention and treatment which her condition really necessitates.

H. VALENTINE KNAGGS.

CORRESPONDENCE.

AMANZIMTOTI, NATAL.

_To the Editors._

SIRS,

You will see that your little magazine finds its way even to this
out-of-the-way corner of the globe, and you may be sure that it is
appreciated. I am specially interested in Dr V. Knaggs'
contributions and should like to ask him a few questions. May I
say that I have some knowledge of chemistry and that I try and
take an interest in the scientific aspects of food reform.

(1) P. 237. What grounds has Dr Knaggs for speaking so definitely
about human magnetism and that of vegetables? How would he
recognise or test for either, and where can I get further
information (scientific) on the question of food magnetism.

(2) Same page. Dr Knaggs says salt added to cooking vegetables
converts organic salts into inorganic. I cannot follow that. _What_
organic salts are so converted? One or two examples would suffice.

(3) I have been reading Dr Rabagliati's _Conversations with Women
Concerning their Health and that of their Children_.[8] In it he
says that food is not the source (cause) of body energy, but is
used merely to replace waste material. Elsewhere I read that
"Professor Atwater's investigations into nutrition have shown in a
most convincing manner that the body derives _all_ its energy from
the food consumed. This may be regarded as established." Which of
these definite and contradictory assertions does Dr Knaggs support,
and why? Where can I get information _re_ Professor Atwater's
experiments and other recent works on similar subjects?

To me the questions involved are intensely interesting, hence my
queries. I hope they do not read as if I were hypercritical or
sceptical.

With all good wishes for the success of your healthy little
magazine. I am, yours, etc.,

W. BLEWETT.

[8] 5s. net. C.W. Daniel, Ltd., 3 Amen Corner, London.

We handed the above interesting letter to our contributor, Dr H. Valentine Knaggs, and append his reply:--

HUMAN MAGNETISM.

There is very little information available from ordinary scientific sources anent the question of the life-force or of the animal magnetism which animates our bodies and is the motive force common to all organic structures whether animal or vegetable. We do know that fresh fruits and vegetables are strongly magnetic because the magnetism which they emit can be gauged by means of delicate galvanometers. It has been found that leaves, flowers and seeds are positively, and roots negatively, charged. We also know that the same conditions are found in the human subject, since Dr Baraduc, who is a celebrated French Psycho-Therapeutist, in his book, "The Vibrations of Human Vitality," tells us that he has invented a machine called a biometer to test these very vibrations. I have had one of these machines myself and have experimented with it a great deal. By its aid we can make the machine work differently with different persons, and by careful tabulation of records Dr Baraduc has been able to elicit some very remarkable information about the magnetic currents which are constantly flowing into and out of the human body. If our correspondent really wants to know more about the wonders of human magnetism he should read some of the voluminous literature upon the subject published by the Theosophical Society. Just recently also a Dr Kilner has invented a form of coloured screen by which he and others who have some psychic sight can actually see the magnetic emanations which flow through a person placed in a darkened room.

SALT-COOKED VEGETABLES.

The one object of the vegetable kingdom is to build up, for the use of the animal or organic realm, the constituents found in the mineral or inorganic kingdom. These mineral constituents are dissolved, sorted out and built up in the right proportions for the use of animals when taken as foods. Whenever these foods are not so eaten they are sent back again to the earth by the aid of microbes during the process of decay, to be again available for plant use. Cooking is a process invented by man which is analogous to that of decay, for it dissolves and disintegrates the structures which Nature has built up. When man eats food that is partially disintegrated he does not obtain from it the right sort of nutriment which Nature intended him to have. To intensify the wrong-doings of the cook, man further hastens the disintegrating process by adding to the things that he cooks a due proportion of a common and very stable mineral, called salt. It is powerful, because it is not easily disintegrated. The salt greatly expedites the process of decay, whether in the natural form of fermentation, or whether by the application of heat, as in cooking. Salt is used in Nature to promote the flow of those electric and magnetic currents which are a manifestation of the universal life-force which pervades all things seen and unseen. It is an essential constituent of the sea because the ocean is the life-blood of the earth. It is an essential constituent of our own blood, because it is needed to make the blood stream a good conductor of magnetic currents. When you put this salt into water and then proceed to boil vegetables in it, it quickly sucks out all the life-force from them, and if persisted in reduces them to the state of minerals from which they were originally constructed.

FOOD AND THE SOURCE OF BODILY ENERGY.

Dr Rabagliati and Professor Atwater are, I believe, both right, but the former does not always explain himself clearly to the lay mind. The life-force or animal magnetism is the real source of bodily energy, and it manifests itself only when it has something that resists or regulates its flow.

It does this just as certain forms of wire, or other materials, which possess indifferent conducting power, resist the flow of electricity through them.

Electricity cannot manifest as light in the usual electric lights used in our houses, as heat in the electric culinary appliances or stoves, or even as power in the motors which run our trams and trains, unless it be given the requisite apparatus to bring about the manifestation required.

In exactly the same way life cannot manifest itself as consciousness, with its flow of thoughts, emotions and bodily activities, without the food which is daily supplied to the body.

It consequently depends considerably upon how we select our daily rations as to how this vital force will manifest within us.

H. VALENTINE KNAGGS.

HOLIDAY APHORISMS.

A Sun Bath needs no Soap.

* * * * *

Man was made for the Weather, not the Weather for man.

* * * * *

A long drink often makes a short walk.

* * * * *

You may bring a man to the Sea, but you cannot make him think.

* * * * *

A tanned face doesn't make a healthy body.

* * * * *

Dew paddling should be done in the dark.

* * * * *

The only things that bathing machines make are cowards.

* * * * *

It is better to board yourself than let others be bored by you.

* * * * *

"A bore is one who thinks his opinions of greater importance than your own."

* * * * *

People who throw pebbles into the sea shouldn't dive near shore.

* * * * *

A toothbrush is what many forget but few should need.

* * * * *

Scotland Yard is not in the Grampians.

* * * * *

Cheap food is often dearly bought.

* * * * *

Lyons have no depots in Skye.

* * * * *

Orange-trees never yet sprang from scattered peel.

* * * * *

A pear in the hand is worth two in the can.

PETER PIPER.

THE

HEALTHY

LIFE

The Independent
Health Magazine.

3 AMEN CORNER LONDON E.C.

VOL. V SEPTEMBER
No. 26. 1913

_There will come a day when physiologists, poets, and
philosophers will all speak the same language and understand one
another._--CLAUDE BERNARD.

AN INDICATION.

Food reformers sometimes forget that "man does not live by bread alone," not even when supplemented by an ample supply of fresh air and physical exercise.

It has been pointed out by psychologists that the more highly organised and highly developed the creature, the less it depends on nervous energy obtained via the stomach and the more it depends on energy generated by the brain. True, the brain must be healthy for this, and one poisoned by impure blood, due to wrong feeding, cannot be healthy. But something more than clean blood is necessary. For, as change of physical posture is necessary to avoid cramped limbs, so periodic reversal of mental attitude (consideration from other than the one view-point) is necessary to the brain's health.

Again, change of air is often prescribed when the patient's real need is a change of the personalities surrounding him. While for the lonely country dweller a bath in the magnetism of a city crowd may be a far more efficacious remedy than the medicinal baths prescribed by his physician.

For man lives by _every_ word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.--[EDS.]

FEAR AND IMAGINATION.

_Regular readers will recognise in this article a continuation of the series previously entitled "Healthy Brains." The author of "The Children All Day Long," is an intimate disciple of one of the greatest living psychologists, and she has a message of the first importance to all who realise that true health depends as much on poise of mind as on physical fitness. We regret that in the previous article, "Imagination in Play," the following misprints occurred:--P. 475, line 4 from top, "movement" should be "moment"; p. 475, line 5 from bottom, "admiration" should be "imagination."_--[EDS.]

Some people are given to excusing their own uncharitable thoughts by saying, "I suppose I ought not to have minded her rudeness; I am afraid I am too sensitive." In the same way, people say, "Oh, I _couldn't_ sleep in the house alone" (or let a child go on a water-picnic, or nurse a case of delirium or do some other thing that suggested itself), "I have too much imagination." In both cases the claim, though put in deprecating form, is made complacently enough. The correlative is: "You are so sensible, dear; I know you won't mind," which is a formula under cover of which many kindnesses may be shirked and many unpleasant duties passed on.

The sensible, practical people who listen to these sayings sometimes attach importance to them, so that a habit has grown up of describing morbidly neurotic people as "over-sensitive" and cowardly ones as "too quick of imagination." Ultimately, this leads to the thought that both sensitiveness and imagination are mental luxuries too costly for ordinary folk to grow, and that it is safest to check, crush or uproot them when we discover them springing up in others or in ourselves.

Is not this attitude of mind due to a misunderstanding? Imagination is an _organ of activity_; it can be kept in the highest possible condition of health by having plenty of exercise; it should be working continually against resistance. A rabbit's gnawing tooth, if the opposing tooth be broken, may grow inwards and cause the creature's death, but the same activity of growth, if working under suitable conditions, enables him to go on living and gnawing at his food year after year without wearing his tools away.

The problem, then, in economy of effort is: How shall we use whatever force of sensitiveness and imagination we have, so as to get its maximum efficiency of usefulness and its minimum pain and inconvenience?

For many ages man has been dominated by fear. His way to freedom, now, is to step out through his cobweb chains and go right forward with courage and in faith. So we are told with relentless and almost tiresome reiteration. It is the fashion, one might almost say, to have cast off fear, and the one thing an honest "modern thinker" is afraid of is being afraid. (To less honest ones it is the thought of _being thought_ afraid that is a very real and present fear.)

But, if this standpoint is right, is not fear at least a vestigial organ, a survival of a mental activity which served its purpose in times gone by? Is it not even truer to go further still and say, as _each particular fear_ serves its purpose it may safely be discarded, but that, as far as our present knowledge goes, other grades of sensitiveness, finer shades of imagination of the type we have called fear, must take its place, to be discarded in their turn for yet other apprehensions?

For if we lost the kind of perception that we associate with fear, if our imagination closed itself automatically to the suggestion of all sorts of ugly possibilities, should we not find ourselves soon in the midst of difficulties akin to those of the hero of the German tale of the man who felt no pain? We accept the evidence of pain as a guide to action; when we have decided on action we proceed to get rid of the pain as expeditiously, safely and permanently as we can.

The same thing seems true of fear. Over and over again we laugh at ourselves for fearing something that either never happened at all or happened in such a way as to be softened out of all likeness to the monstrous terror we had created. On the other hand, when misfortune falls heavily because of our lack of imagination in not foreseeing possible consequences of particular actions or events, we lament and complain: "If I could only have guessed! If I had only known!"

Fear pure and simple--the imagination of possible trouble--is a stage we can hardly yet afford to do without. But when it has roused our attention to a danger, its work is done. Let us practise turning it into action; taking due precautions against accident, guarding against hurting a neighbour's feelings, watching some possibility of evil tendency in ourselves. Then, and not till then, may we let it drop. It may pass; it has done its work. It is no longer our responsibility to foresee, it is our privilege to lay down the fear and live happily and at peace.

Even the dread perceptions of eternal laws come under the same method. "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom," the _beginning_: the end is faith and love.

E.M. COBHAM.

+--------------------------------------------------------------+ | | | #To Our Readers.# | | | | Readers who appreciate the independence and all-round nature | | of _The Healthy Life_ can materially assist the extension of | | its circulation by tactfully urging their local newsagent to | | have the magazine regularly displayed for sale. An | | attractive monthly poster can always be had free from the | | Publishers, 3 Tudor Street, London, E.C. | | | +--------------------------------------------------------------+

HOW MUCH SHOULD WE EAT?

_The article (signed "M.D.") with the above title which we published in the July number has, as we anticipated, aroused considerable discussion. One interesting criticism appeared in the August number. We now publish two further contributions, to be followed, in our next issue, by two further articles by Dr Rabagliati and Mr Ernest Starr._--[EDS.]

I

As one who has tried the low proteid diet, and came to grief on it, I desire to set my experience against that of Mr Voysey,[9] and to assert that, if it is true for him, it certainly is not true for me. Mr Voysey indulges in many loose and generalised statements which do not help the average man or woman in the least. I imagine it is these that "M.D." has in mind when he advises a certain standard of diet, below which it is not safe to go. If Mr Voysey can, as Horace Fletcher can, exist on a very low proteid diet, that does not prove that all men and women can do the same and be healthily active; it only shows that he and Fletcher are exceptions to the average person, and that it may be dangerous to follow their example. For most men, "M.D.'s" proteid standard is not so nauseating as he finds it. Here is a specimen dietary for a day, for a man of ten stone, following, as most of us do, a sedentary occupation:--

3 oz. cheese.
9 oz. bread.
8 oz. vegetables and salad.
8 oz. fruit.
1+1/2 pints milk.

Will any average person say that that quantity, divided into three meals, would be nauseating to him? And is that diet so very expensive that it would be beyond the means of an agricultural labourer in any country? It is certainly no mockery. The cost to such a labourer would probably not exceed 3d. or 4d. Of course the diet can be made as expensive as one chooses, and widely varied.

[9] See August number.

Who amongst ordinary men and women has a reliable natural taste that would be an infallible guide in all matters of food? And what a misleading statement that is which asserts "that all the hardest work of the world has always been done by those who get the least food." Put it to the test on the average person and see where it leads to.

My contention is that the average person, throwing over his or her accustomed meat diet, requires some definite guidance as to the quantity of proteid, such as Dr Haig's wide experience and much patient research have proved needful, or at least advisable, for the continuance of a healthy and vigorous life; and I will say that it does not help this average person in the least to put before him the misty statement that "the quantity depends on the development that is in progress, and is only discoverable by the natural guides of appetite and taste, ruled by reason and love of others." All very noble and very well in another place, but hardly meeting the case of the ordinary person who is seeking a healthy diet. Nor can you "make the body a more harmonious instrument for the true life of man" by habitually underfeeding it. I thought that was a mediaeval notion that had been knocked on the head long ago.

Is there any man, lay or scientific, Mr Voysey notwithstanding, who can claim to have as wide an experience of diet in its relation to health and disease as "M.D.," to say nothing of the trained mind and long years of patient thought that have been exerted in dealing with the facts of this wide experience. For myself, I have come to see that, if "M.D." does not hold in his grasp the absolute truth in the matter of diet, he is nearer to it, and is a safer guide, than all your low proteid advisers, lay or otherwise, where they come much below "M.D.'s" standard.

So, using Mr Voysey's phrases, I would urge laymen like myself to shun that weak-kneed manikin, the low proteid diet, and unite with me in a long strong pull to get him and others like him out of the rut in which that sorry weakling holds him.

HY. BARTHOLOMEW.

II

The Editors were quite right in saying that the article under this heading in the July issue would arouse discussion. My wife and I, having discussed "M.D." and many others with the title, feel constrained to put forth a warning against blind faith in anything which the faculty have to say on dietetics.

There are of course brilliant exceptions, such as Dr Rabagliati, Dr Knaggs, Dr Haig, the late Dr Keith and others, who give chapter and verse for every statement made; but when we consider the excellent work of laymen such as Albert Broadbent, Joseph Wallace, Horace Fletcher, Alice Braithwaite, Eustace Miles, Hereward Carrington, Edgar J. Saxon, Bernarr MacFadden, Arnold Eiloart, ordinary folks like ourselves may be excused if we venture to give our experience as against that of "qualified" men.

With your permission, then, we reply to "M.D.'s" five suggestions in the order he gives them:--

1. Food qualities are _not_ of extreme importance.

2. Quantity tables may have been "settled" by physiologists to their own satisfaction many years ago; but very good reasons have since been given for altering, or even ignoring, them.

3. The particular number of grains of proteid to be consumed per day is not of serious moment.

4. That departure from the quantity specified has not led to disaster is proved by the fact that the human race still persists, in spite of the very varying eating customs found in different nations. The great majority being poor or ignorant, or both, know neither "tables" nor the need for them.

5. There can be no reply to such a general statement as: "The nature of this disaster may appear to be very various, and its real cause is thus frequently overlooked."

In such matters an ounce of personal experience is worth a pound of cut-and-dried theory. We--my wife and I--have been reared in an atmosphere suspicious of doctors, both sets of grandparents having relied rather on herbs, water treatment, goodness of heart and faith in God; and their children have had too many evidences of medical ignorance to accept any dogmas. We are anti-vaccinators, nearly vegetarian, and, to come to the point, we have four children who will persist in thriving on a basis of always too little rather than too much of food. The respective ages are girl 13, boy 10, girl 6, boy 2.

All have been brought up on these lines: never pressed to eat, but continually asked to chew thoroughly. Foods "rich in proteid" put sparingly before them. Milk has been well watered; and eggs, bacon and other tempting and rich foods only on rare occasions given to them.

We would ask readers who can to make the following experiment: Let your children have a good drink to start the day, and then run and play; don't offer food till asked for. You will almost to a certainty find, if you start this plan immediately after weaning, that day by day and year after year it is twelve to one o'clock before they inquire for "something to eat." We have done this for twelve years, with children of entirely different temperament and of both sexes. They go to school, poor things! breakfastless. During these twelve years light breakfast for father has been on the table--he goes without lunch--and not once in fifty do they ask to join him. Nor, if invited, will they after three or four years of age.

The have never had a fever which lasted more than a day or two, and they are all above average height and weight.

They get fruit in season just as asked for, and as much to drink as they like, _but not at meal-times_.

Our experience is over a period of twelve years, and we have come to the conclusion that the infectious diseases so prevalent and death-dealing amongst children of all classes, rich or poor, are, in the main, the result of over-feeding. We find it wise to keep highly nutritious foods (like eggs, cheese, meat, etc.) away from children--that is, for regular consumption; a little occasionally may do no harm.

You will have it borne in on our minds year by year, as your children grow up under such a plan, that Dr Rabagliati, Hereward Carrington and others are quite right. We do not get our strength, nor heat, from food. Let the force of animal life (zoo-dynamic, I believe Dr Rabagliati calls it) have free play, and your children can't help growing up well and strong.

In to-day's _London Daily Chronicle_ I see a special article by Dr Saleeby, under this heading: WORLD'S DOCTORS VERSUS DISEASE. 5000 MEDICAL MEN MEET TO-DAY. THE TRIUMPHS OF THREE DECADES. We know how much this wonderful faculty knew thirty years ago about, _e.g._, fresh air for consumptives. There is not a word said in this article (which is a sort of programme of the weighty matters for discussion) on the relation of food to the body. That question probably 4950 of them believe was settled by the eminent physiologists who compiled those "food-tables" years ago--and in so doing went far to pave the way for the modern frightful increase of cancer, Bright's disease, etc., as well as for "scientific" horrors like anti-toxin, tuberculin--not to mention compulsory eugenics!

J. METHUEN.

HEALTH THROUGH READING.

Do many people consider reading from the point of view of health of mind and body--of refreshment in times of struggle--of recuperation after knock-down blows of sorrow, disappointment or misfortune?

Let us begin by saying that some of the greatest books are not to be read by everybody at all seasons. When one's heart or ankles are weak, one does not start to climb mountains, or one may end as a corpse or a cripple. So with one's soul under shock or stress. Personally, I can imagine nothing more cruel than the action of two women, one a story-teller of great repute among the "goody," who, to a specially stricken and lonely young widow, tendered as "bed-side books," Victor Hugo's _Les Miserables_ and Browning's poignant _The Ring and the Book_. If they had wished to make her realise to the bitterest depths the awfulness of the world wherein she was left alone, and the blackest depravity of the human nature around her, they could not have done differently. _Les Miserables_ she read till she reached the dreadful scene where a vicious cad hurls snowballs at the helpless Fantine. Then the strong instinct of self-preservation made her put the book aside--not to touch it again for nearly thirty years. With _The Ring and the Book_ her mind was too wrung and too weary to wrestle--all it could receive was a picture of wronged innocence, and especially of the rampant forces of evil with which she was left to contend. With the same want of tact and judgment, if with unconscious cruelty, the gloomy, fateful _Bride of Lammermoor_ was selected out of all Scott's novels for the reading of a very homesick youth, solitary in a strange country!

Yet we must always remember that, as in affairs of the body so of the spirit, "what is one man's meat may be another man's poison." Some of the wisest and most successful nurses or doctors will occasionally permit an invalid to indulge in a longed-for diet which would certainly never be prescribed. They know that idiosyncrasy follows no exactly known rule. So we could tell of one who, amid the dry agnosticism of the later half of last century, had felt her faith, not indeed extinguished, but obscured and darkened. From the perusal of certain writers she had shrunk, perhaps with cowardice. They were put on such a pinnacle that she feared she would find no arguments fit to oppose to theirs. Weakly, she locked the skeleton cupboard. Then she was attacked by a malady which, while leaving her mind free and strong, she knew might be very speedily fatal. Straightway she said to her husband: "In two or three days I shall probably 'know'--or cease from all knowing. There will not be long to wait. Therefore bring me three books," which she named, works of authors of extreme agnostic views. Rather reluctantly he complied with her wish. She went steadily through the joyless pages, turned the last with the significant remark: "If this is all they can say, well!--" The skeleton cupboard, once opened, was speedily swept out. She quickly recovered, but never forgot her experience. Yet it must be remembered that this was the patient's own prescription, and was permitted by one who thoroughly understood her temperament. Therefore, though one would never wish to overrule a strong personal desire, that is quite different from offering counsel and furtherance--or proving experiments upon oneself.

A celebrated woman writer of the middle of last century was of opinion that young people of both sexes should not indulge in reading "minor poetry." "Let them keep to the great poets, made of granite," was her graphic phrase. A woman of singularly self-controlled nature has confessed that the only time in her whole life that she experienced an unwholesome moral and emotional disturbance, after reading a book, was when, at about twenty-two years of age, she read Emily Bronte's _Wuthering Heights_. She dared not finish it: and when, some time later, a copy was presented to her, she caused it to be exchanged for another book, not wishing it even to be in the house with her. Years afterwards, she read it again, quite unmoved. It may be added that her first reading was made in the course of a systematic study of English literature, which had already led her through the works of Chaucer and Fielding. She has herself asked: "Is it possible that the strong and unpleasant effect was produced because the book was the production of another young woman, perhaps of somewhat 'sympathetic' temperament?"

Taken as a whole, probably most fiction and all highly emotional work of any sort should be indulged in sparingly by those in the danger-zone of life, or by any under special mental or moral stress. History, philosophy (with sustained chains of reasoning) and biographies (best, autobiographies) of active and strenuous lives, should be resorted to by those temporarily doomed to spells of suspense and involuntary inaction. Invalids should be encouraged to read Plutarch's _Lives_ rather than the _Memorials_ of other sufferers, however saintly!

It may be broadly stated that, during the tragic episodes which seem to occur in all lives, the most wholesome reading is to be found in the books of the great World-Religions--the Bible, and the teachings of Buddha, Confucius and Mahomet. The Bible is of course a library in itself, and many of its books are suited to very widely different circumstances and temperaments. The Psalms, the Gospels, the Epistle of St James, and parts of those great poems known as the "prophetical books" and the more personal and less doctrinal portions of Paul's epistles are perhaps of widest application. From the words of Buddha, Confucius and Mahomet there are many admirable selections--and one remembers a wonderful compilation of more than thirty years ago, called _The Sacred Anthology_, and wonders if it be out of print. It does not follow that these works should not be studied at other times than "tragic episodes." If this were more often the case, perhaps there would be fewer "tragic episodes"!

Next to these come such wonderful books of spiritual experience as A Kempis's _Imitation of Christ_, the _Pilgrim's Progress_, the _Devout Life_ of Francis of Sales and others which will occur to the memory.

Allusion to the _Pilgrim's Progress_ brings us to the remark that no books are more truly wholesome than some that can be enjoyed by those of all ages, and of very varied types of "culture": in which the children can delight, and which refresh the aged and weary. Like Nature herself, they have hedgerows where the little ones can gather flowers, little witting of the farther horizons of earth and sky lifted up for the eyes of the elders. Let the children read the _Pilgrim's Progress_ simply as "a story," its eternal verities will sink into their souls to reappear when they too are in _Vanity Fair_ or in bitter conflict with _Apollyon_.

For the same reason, the Book of Proverbs should be commended to youthful study. Under wise supervision--or rather, in mutual study--it becomes at once a series of vivid pictures of primitive Eastern life--for all allusions should be explained, where possible, pictorially--while at the same time the memory will be insensibly stored with shrewd common sense and knowledge of the world, to be turned to, and drawn upon, as needed.

And then, while the children revel in the fun and the fancy of Hans Andersen's _Fairy Tales_, let the sorrowful or sore or wounded heart turn to them for solace, soothing or healing. Hans Andersen enjoys a very special "popularity" and yet some, who have learned to love and value him, doubt whether justice has yet been done to his work. Because it is matchless for the young, it may be easily forgotten that it can be so, only by some quality which makes it matchless for all others. Perhaps some of his most popular stories are not his most wonderful, but have simply caught the popular fancy, because of some artist's illustration, or some personal application to the writer's own history, as in the case of his _Ugly Duckling_. How many--or rather, how few!--can readily recall the pathos and wit of his _Portuguese Duck_ or the deep philosophy of his _Girl Who Trod on a Loaf_?

It is told of Hans Andersen, a gentle soul in a homely exterior, which attracted the snubs and neglect which "patient merit of the unworthy takes," on some such occasion was once heard to murmur: "And yet I am the greatest man now in the world!" It was very naive of him to say so, even in a whisper, probably wrung from him only in self-defence, but perhaps he might have thought it, in solemn silence--and--not been so very wrong! It may have been part of the very transparency of his inspired genius that he could not keep the secret to himself!

There is at least one reader who declares that she finds the seeds of all vital philosophy--ancient or modern--in his stories. How much he derived from those who went before him, it is not for us to say, but this disciple, herself a devoted student and admirer of the world's latest teacher, Leo Tolstoy, yet puts Hans Andersen above him, as having attained in practically all his work what Tolstoy attained only occasionally--_i.e._ Tolstoy's own ideal of what Art should be and do.

In such a paper as this little can be done beyond indicating on the broadest lines the kind of reading which tends to preserve or to restore mental health. Away with your "problem" novels and "realistic" poems stated in the filthy material of moral gutters! Hans Andersen will take some birds, some flowers, some toys, and will state the same problems, and get the same eternal solutions, without making the inquirer run any risk of meanwhile catching moral malaria. Isaiah will help us to build "castles" for the human race and for our own future, but he will take care that we shall remember that righteousness and unceasing vigilance and unflagging repair must go into the laying of foundations and the upholding of walls. David, even in his "cursing psalms," will exemplify for you the power of hate and vengeance in your own heart, and as he holds it up before you, you will see how small a thing it is, how mean, how ludicrous!

As a man eats and drinks, so is his body: if he is a gross feeder, his body will be gross and sensual; if his food lacks nourishment, he will pine and fade. So it is with our minds and our morals. With whatever original "spiritual body" we may start, it needs spiritual sustenance, spiritual discipline, spiritual sufficiency and spiritual abstinence. Too often we ill-use it, as bodies are ill-used, goading its weakness with fiery excitement, or gorging its greed with sickly sentiment, or emasculating it by empty frivolity.

All who desire spiritual health must find out what books best promote it in themselves: and sometimes they are found, like wholesome herbs, in very lowly places. One good rule is never to recommend what we have not seen proved in ourselves, or on others.

ISABELLA FYVIE MAYO.

THE SWAN-SONG OF SEPTEMBER.

This fine sonnet is from _Lyric Leaves_, poems by S. Gertrude
Ford. 2s. 6d. net (postage 2d.). (C.W. Daniel, Ltd., 3 Tudor
Street, London, E.C.)

Sing out thy swan-song with full throat, September,
From a full heart, with golden notes and clear!
No rose will wreathe thee; yet the harebell's here,
And still thy crown of heath the hills remember.
Bright burns thy fire, e'en to its latest ember,
The sunset fire that lights thee to thy bier,
Flaming and failing not, albeit so near
Dun-robed October waits, and grey November.
And though, at sight of thee, a chill change passes
Through wood and wold, on leaves and flowers and grasses,
Thy beauty wanes not; thou hast ne'er grown old;
Death-crowned as Cleopatra, lovely lying
Even to the end; magnificently dying
In pomp of purple and in glare of gold.

S. GERTRUDE FORD.

THE QUEST FOR BEAUTY.

If you have travelled at all frequently on certain of the London "tube" railways you may occasionally have noticed, facing you in the carriage, a small framed poster which for beauty and imaginative power has, I should think, never been surpassed in advertising art. If the first sight of it did not make you catch your breath you will not, I am afraid, be interested in this article.

The poster represents a rich landscape, in which noble tree-forms show sombre against a tumultuous sky--the latter an architectural mass of pale cloud, spanned by a vivid rainbow. Across the lower part of the picture is a scroll, on which are written, in musical notation, two bars from Chopin's Twentieth Prelude. At the top are the words, _Studies in Harmony_: it is an advertisement of Somebody & Co.'s wall-papers.

In both colour and design this poster is very beautiful. It would be scarcely less so without the rainbow; but "the dazzling prism of the sky" not only intensifies the subtle harmony of colour throughout the picture: it turns the poster into a symbol. And the artist might well have stopped there; only, you see, he had an inspiration. When he wrote across the picture those eight descending chords from the immortal _Largo_ he made of the poster--a poem.

I do not know anything about the artist who conceived this advertisement of wall-papers. I do not even know his name. But I believe him to be the herald of an invasion.

The invasion of life by beauty.

Do you think it a degradation of art that it should be enlisted by the makers of wall-papers? Are there not too many ugly and discordant posters? Do you consider trade and manufacture so sordid that they are beneath the ministrations of beauty? It doesn't matter a new penny whether you answer such questions with a nod or a no: the invasion has begun. It is irresistible. Beauty is stooping--stooping to conquer.

Your ardent social reformer is too often obsessed with one idea. Across his mental firmament he sees only one blazing word: INJUSTICE. And, fine fellow though he often is, he is inclined to be impatient with any talk of art or beauty. "How can beauty grow in these vile cities?" he cries. "What is the use of your music, your statuary, your fine pictures, your poetry, to the starving and the oppressed?" And he does not see that his passionate desire for justice is at root the quest for beauty, for fullness and harmony of life. His stormy sky shows no rainbow: yet it is there. And so is the stately music, the transmutation of colour into sound. And if his eyes could be opened to one and his ears to the other, there would be more power to his elbow. For beauty is inspiration and courage--

"My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky...."

And there is more than that in it. The cultivation of a sense of beauty, of harmony, makes reformers less harsh in their judgments, broadens their sympathies and helps to save them from becoming mere doctrinaires. If you have any love for the beautiful you simply cannot be happy about most Utopias, though they be Justice itself in civic form; and, when our "scientific" Fabian has demonstrated to you how to organise the national life in all its parts into one vast smoothly working State mechanism you will shudder, and then laugh. And then, without any rudeness, you will say: "Hang mechanism and a minimum wage! Live men and women want living crafts, liberty and a maximum beauty!"

And really, I am coming to see that there are a great many health-culture enthusiasts (not to mention food reformers) who see no rainbow in the sky and hear no music in the wind; and even if they did, ten to one they would see no connection between the two. I verily believe there are some poor souls who have studied food questions so closely that they cannot see the sun for proteid nor the sea for salts. In all meekness, and knowing the frailty of the human mind (I have written dozens of articles on diet!), I would prescribe for them a course of artistic wall-paper advertisements, combined with the letters of Robert Louis Stevenson. He, poor fellow, had to battle against disease all his short life; but he managed to end one of his letters something like this (I quote from memory): "_Sursum Corda_! Heave ahead! Art and blue heaven! April and God's larks! A stately music.... Enter God."

A somewhat ecstatic utterance. A trifle too exclamatory. Perhaps. You and I don't end our letters like that. (Or do you?) More likely we say something about the weather down here being miserably cold (or damp, or dull, or changeable, or hot) and brave out the lie with "yours truly." But O for one little spark from the fire that shone in the soul of R.L.S. Better to die young with a broken heart, if it were a heart as brave and gay as his, than beat Methuselah by means of a mincing, calculating, cold-blooded attention to irritating self-made little rules.

Oh yes, I know well the value of little rules. And I know also that Nature offers us only two alternatives--obedience or death (either sudden or slow). But then Nature is something more than Mistress and Lawgiver. She is Beauty. And in that aspect, as in all other aspects, Nature is unescapable. We turn our backs on her only to find her awaiting us at the next turn in the road. Looking at the matter all round, I don't think we can come to any other conclusion than that Nature (or whatever you like to call It, Her or Him) is aiming at beauty all the time. So that we who are literally, if not figuratively, the children of Nature, had best do likewise.

Some mystic or other has said that man's search for God is God's search for man. If he was right--and I think he was--it follows that man's quest for beauty is Beauty invading life; and that the only healthy life worth the having is that which begins with "Lift up your hearts!" and issues in "a stately music. Enter God."

EDGAR J. SAXON.

* * * * *

_SEMPER FIDELIS._

Do two things worth doing, every day.
Be scrupulously polite and kind, rather than witty or entertaining.
Cherish cleanliness, sobriety, frugality and contentment.
Cultivate sweetness of disposition and tranquillity of mind.
Think before speaking, and so reduce your causes of regret.
Seek peace and be peaceable for _lis litem generat_.
Begin at home, let home always find you faithfully on duty.
Care carefully for those whom Providence has entrusted to your care.
And the reward of the faithful will abundantly yours,
And your heaven will go with you wherever you go.

"A.R."

MORE HOLIDAY APHORISMS.

Two's company, three's fun.

* * * * *

Levity is the bane of wit.

* * * * *

Braggers mustn't be losers.

* * * * *

Never put on to-day what you can't put on to-morrow.

* * * * *

It's an ill mind that finds no one any good.

* * * * *

It's no use crying over spilt milk: you're better without it.

* * * * *

Look before you sleep.

* * * * *

Never put an excursion ticket in the mouth.

* * * * *

Long hair never made true poets.

* * * * *

Obesity always carries weight.

* * * * *

Look after your manners and your friends will look after themselves.

* * * * *

Cranks of a feather fight together.

* * * * *

All is not toil that blisters.

* * * * *

_To Sea Anglers_:

A live catch is no better than a dead fish.

* * * * *

Better a place in the sun than a plaice on a hook.

PETER PIPER.

HEALTHY HOMEMAKING.