Charles Dickens, in one of his wildest moods, makes Sam
Weller tell a story of a man who, to prove that muffins were wholesome, ate three shillings' worth of muffins on principle, "toasted 'em all, buttered 'em all, eat 'em all, and blew his brains out." That man has been outdone. On Good Friday, George Dunning, a respectable draper of Horton, aged seventy-five, after breakfast ate fourteen hot-cross buns. Whether he did it on principle or not is not recorded, but surely nothing less could -tempt a man with the means to buy bread and salt to consume those indigestible edibles. Of course the nasty mess swelled, distended Dunning's stomach till it pressed on vital organs, and in a few hours killed him with great suffering. The incident will, let us hope, help to decrease the consumption of articles about as Et for food as sponge, and rather less palatable.
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