DR. TRUMAN ON FOOD.

Tins is a very pleasant volume on a very vital subject, and in which the most philosophical engage some twice or thrice a day, unless they belong to that unfortunately large class (which Dr. TRUMAN expressly excludes from consideration) whose ill condition arises from a "paucity rather than a superabundance of food." In this essay on aliment, an immense number of facts are brought together, relating to some of the four thousand articles with which man at various times and under various circumstances has gratified his palate or satisfied his hunger. The curious epi- cure may obtain from Dr. TRUMAN'S essay on Food, a precis of the history, not of eating, but of things eaten ; and learn the reason why certain national dainties, to him nauseous— as whale-blubber—are desired by the peoples which indulge in them. Here too he will find a judicious and discriminating advo- cacy of cookery as a chemical art, whose object, like that of all arts, is to develop for the gratification of man the qualities found in nature; a medical inquiry into the nutritive properties of the different classes of food—animals, vegetables, fish, and so forth ; together with some hints touching the management of his own diet, and an interesting exhibition of some physiological wonders in our microcosm or little world. The execution of the whole, more- over, is as agreeable as the matter is attractive; the style, with a gossipy character, possessing a closeness and neatness which rise to easy clearness in the chemical or physiological expositions.

The reader must not extend this praise, or expect from the work, what it does not possess, and probably never aimed at : essentially it has no principle of any novelty ; the account of the elements of animal and vegetable food—the fibrin, albu- men, &c. of animals—the gluten, mucilage, &c. in vegetables—.

with the respective proportions of nourishment they yield, and their respective facilities of digestion—may be found in many books on chemistry and dietetics. Some of the physiological exposi- tions, though not new, are less popularly known ; and many of the facts are not to be called new in strictness, for we all knew that Frenchmen eat frogs, and cannibals human flesh. The attraction lies in the clear arrangement, the novel air imparted to the facts by bringing so many of them together, and the easy pleasantness of style with which they are presented.

The defect of the book, to us, is its want of conclusion. When we have read it through, we are much where we were as regards speci- fic rules of diet. Dr. TRUMAN says, indeed, that many constitutions have an idiosyncracy which enables them to take, and even with benefit, things that are injurious to others: but this we knew before. He cautions the reader against improper abstinence, as likely to be injurious : but CELSUS, nearly two thousand years ago, announced a somewhat similar opinion, when he warned mankind, in varying their mode of life (by sleep, watching, food, fasting, &c.) to tend towards the benign extreme. Our author dwells upon the advantage of influ- encing the body by diet rather than medicine: but BACON, and pro- bably others before him, propounded a similar rule, and for the reason that " diets alter the body more and trouble it less." Dr. Taumerr, however, gives the ?nod= operandi of diet—which, no doubt, imparts more impress and conviction to the rule. The principal axiom we have deduced from Food and its Influence on Health and Disease, is the popular and genial one—Live variously and well; eat mixed food; Nature intended man to live on variety; • and do not be de- luded into Cornaro systems of diet, for the old Venetian had a pe- culiar idiosyncracy, and was an invalid to boot.

"The instance of Cornaro, who improved his health so much by great frugality of diet, is therefore frequently most improperly quoted; for, though the plan of living he followed might suit some persons, it would infallibly cause disease, and ultimately death, if rigorously adopted by moat people. The account he has left of the small quantities of food he was in the habit of subsisting on, is alone sufficient to show how injurious the majority of individuals would find an attempt to live in a similar manner. He tells us that he was extremely unhealthy and decrepid up to the age of forty, when he determined on adopting a most abstemious plan of diet, and eating every thing by weight. The entire quan- tity of food he took daily consisted- of twelve ounces of bread, eggs, &c., and fourteen ounces of liquids, making altogether only twenty-six otttiCeS of food, solid and liquid. By following this course, he recovered his health, and lived to be one hundred and four years of age. Many may suppose that the long life he attained proves the healthiness of his mode of living; it vras certainly healthy for him, and might be so for any other person in a similar state of body to himself: but he must always be cons: lered as a sort of in- valid, in whom the powers of nutrition were very weak, and unable to assimiliate a larger quantity of nourishment ; for if he had ever required more food, he could not have borne it—as was proved by the addition of merely two ounces of solid food to his usual allowance always causing him fever ; and yet a more generous diet would undoubtedly bare been very Lene- ficial to him, if he could have supported it. It is by no means desirable to try and subsist upon too little food; for this practice occasionally induces a pecu- liar condition of the stomach, which renders it incapable of bearing the stimu- lus of the quantity of nourishment necessary for a vigorous state of body."

As we know not that our general account of Dr. TRUMAN'S book has conveyed a sufficiently distinct idea of its nature and execution, (which is indeed not very easily conveyed by description,) we will draw pretty freely upon its varied contents, that they may speak for themselves.

RErTILE FOOD.

The animals belonging to the class Reptilia which afford food to man are not numerous. The turtle supplies a very nutritious and wholesome article of diet ; and, now that the voyage between this country and the West Indies is made in such a short time by steam-boats, it will no doubt be imported in greater abundance with much advantage to our population at large. Turtle was first introduced into this country, as an article of food, about the middle of the seventeenth century. The following extract from the Gentleman's Magazine for the year 1753 shows it was at that time considered a great rarity—" Friday, August 31. A turtle weighing 350 pounds was ate at the King's Arms Tavern, Pall Mall : the mouth of an oven was taken down to admit the part to be baked." The greater number of turtle consumed in Lon- don are brought from Jamaica ; where much care its bestowed on breeding and preserving them : they are sold in the shops in that island at a less cost than beef or mutton. Sonic of them are so large, that one would he a sufficient re- past for a hundred persons, and admit of fourteen men standing with ease at the same time on its back.

Serpents are eaten in many parts of the world : the American Indians are very fond of rattlesnakes, cooked as we dress eels. The anaconda, and other boas, afford a wholesome diet to the natives of the countries they inhabit. Adders are stated to be used as food in many parts of France and Italy. Cro- codiles, the guano, and other lizards, are eaten in South America and the Ba- hama Islands. The bull-frog is considered in America as good as turtle.

THE DELUDED FAtuSIANS.

The Rana esculanta, or edible frog, is a favourite article of diet in France, Germany, and Italy. Toads seem also to be eaten by the French, though un- wittingly. Professor Dumeril used to relate, in his lectures at the Jardin des Plantes, that the frogs brought to the markets in Paris are caught in the stag- nant waters round Montmorenei, in the Bois de Vincennes, Bois de Boulogne, &c. The people employed in this traffic separate the hind-quarters and legs of the frog from the body, denude them of their skin, arrange them on skewers as larks are done in this countrf, and then bring them in that state to market. In seeking for frogs, these dealers often meet with toads ; which they do not reject, but prepare them in the same way as they would frogs ; and, as it is impossible to determine whether the hind-quarters of these creatures, after the skin is stripped off, belong to frogs or toads, it continually happens that great numbers of the supposed frogs sold in Paris for food are actually toads.

INSEcT FOOD.

Humboldt says, the children in some parts of South America may be seen dragging enormous centipedes from their holes and craunching them between their teeth without compunction. The white ant is eaten by the Indians in Brazil, Guano, on the banks of the Rio Negro, and Cassiquiaire. The Ne- groes in the West Indies are very partial to a caterpillar filund on the palm- tree. The Caffre hordes of South Africa feed upon locusts, ants, and a variety of insects too numerous for detail. Locusts and grasshoppers are eaten in Syria, Arabia, Egypt, Abyssinia, Madagascar, and China. The Chinese also eat the chrysalises of the silk-worm, the larva of the sphynx-moth, and a grub found at the root of the sugar-cane. Snails are taken as food in many parts of Europe. The earth-worm is eaten in Van Diemen's Land. The Green- landers, Negroes, and Chinese eat the pedieulus humanus; the Javans have also been accused of eating these insects, but this they deny, though they con- fess to biting them.

PRE-EMINENCE OF MILK.

This is one of the most important articles of diet derived from the animal kingdom, and has many remarkable properties worthy of notice belonging to it. In the course of this work it will be shown, that the higher orders of animals require a mixture of different alimentary substances for their nutri- tion; for when they are limited to any one kind of food, their condition is either deteriorated, or disorganization of structure ensues. Milk is the only aliment which offers an exception to this rule—that is to say, which is capable of supporting life alone. Dr. Front has well remarked, that all other aliment- ary matters exist for themselves, or for the use of the animal or vegetable of which they form a constituent part. Milk, however, is prepared by nature expressly as food, being of no other use to animals whatever. It would natur- ally be expected, that since milk possesses the nutrient property in so eminent a degree, its composition must be peculiar, and contain a greater diversity of the principles forming alimentary matter than other kinds of food. Such, indeed, is the fact ; for every sort of animal milk is composed of albumen, oil, and sugar, suspended in a large quantity of water. The proportions in which these three substances are united in different kinds of milk vary exceedingly, but they have always been found to exist in the milk of all animals.

RATIONALE OF RAW OYSTERS.

Albumen coagulates on being exposed for a few minutes to a temperature of 165 deg. Fahrenheit ; which causes different processes of cookery greatly to vary the digestible properties of substances containing an abundance of it. Eggs exposed to a high temperature, merely long enough to cause partial coa- gulation of the albumen, are much lighter and more digestible than they are after the application of heat to them has been continued to complete it, or as it is termed, till they are boiled hard. The digestible qualities of oysters may be modified in a similar manner. In a raw state, or when the albumen they contain is uncoagulated, a great number may be eaten without causing any bad effects. One of the most distinguished French physiologists of the present day used to declare, he did not care about eating oysters unless he could be sup- plied with at least twelve or fourteen dozen for his own share ; a number Ile was continually in the habit of taking at one meal, without experiencing any symp- toms of indigestion. Numerous other instances could be adduced of persons eating similar quantities with impunity. Stewed oysters, however, in which the albumen is coagulated, could not, in all probability, be partaken of with similar freedom, without causing a great derangement of the stomachs.

TAPIOCA.

SIM& is often combined with poisonous substances ; and many anxious mo- thers will be surprised to hear that the mild, bland, demulcent tapioca, is obtained from the root of the jatropha manihot, a plant indi,..enous to the Bra- zils, Guiana, and the West India Islands, which is one of the most active poisons known, causing death in a few minutes after it has been swallowed. The roots of this plant, which contain a great quantity of sap, are peeled and subjected to pressure in bags made of rushes. The juice thus forced out 35 50 deadly a poison, that it is employed by the Indians as a poison for their arrofrs. On being allowed to stand, however, it soon deposits a white starch, which, when propbrly washed, is quite innocent. This starch is then dried in smoke, and afterwards passed through a sieve; and is the substance from which tapioca and the cassava bread of the Indians is prepared. The discovery of the process for separating this powder from the jatropha manihot has been of the greatest importance to the human race, since it enables us to obtain a most valuable article of food from a plant that is of a highly poisonous nature, but which con- tains an enormous quantity of nutritious matter; for it is asserted that one acre of manihot will afford nourishment for more persons than six acres of wheat.

MODERN EPICUREAN EXPLOITS.

Europeans may justly lay claim to the merit of having been most instru- mental in conveying the different animals and vegetables most useful as articles of diet from one country to another. From Europe and Asia they have ear- ned our common ruminants, and fowls, corn, sugar, rice, tamarinds, tea, coffee, some spices, oranges, and many other vegetables, to America and Australasia. They have brought back from America in return, the turkey, maize, potatoee, manilla, the pine-apple, &c., and transported them to different regions in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australasia, where the climate and soil are htted for their existence and growth. They have thus conferred a great benefit on the human race in general; for the more completely this interchange is carried out, the more will the means for nourishing the body be multiplied, which is the best way to improve its condition.

EFFECTS OF CULTURE.

The almond, with its tough coriaceous husk, has been changed by long cul- ture into the peach, with its beautiful, soft, and delicious pulp; the acrid sloe, into the luscious plum ; and the harsh, bitter crab, into the golden pippin. Attention to nutrition has produced quite as marked changes in the pear, cherry, and other fruit-trees; many of which have not ooly been altered in their qualities and appearance, but even in their habits. Celery, so agreeable to most palates, is a modification of the apium graveolens, the taste of which is so acrid and bitter that it cannot be eaten. Our cauliflowers and cabbages, which weigh many pounds, are largely-developed coleworts, that grow wild on the sea- shore, and do not weigh more than half an ounce each. The rose has been produced by cultivation from the common wild-briar. Many plants may be podified with advantage by suppressing the growth of one part, which causes Increased development of other parts.