The New Glutton or Epicure. Fletcher Horace

to remain incog. In this seclusion, however, Ralph D. Blumenfeld, Esquire, of London, and Roswell Martin Field, Esquire, of Chicago, cannot be included; neither can Charles Jay Taylor, the originator of the Taylor-Maid girl. James P. Reilly, Esquire, of New York, has lightened the labours of the investigator, and has strengthened his arm in many ways; as have also Messrs. B. F. Stevens and Brown, of London, not alone as most efficient agents, but as friends interested in the cause in hand. In the various books of the series opportunity has occurred to express appreciation of many sympathetic friendships, and in heart and memory they hold perpetual carnival. To Major Thomas E. Davis, of the New Orleans Picayune, is due more than mere expression of gratitude for excellent editorials on our subject; and across the ocean, Sir Thomas Barlow, the private physician of King Edward VII, Dr. Leonard Huxley, Prof. Alfred Marshall, of Cambridge University, and Reginald Barratt, Esquire, of London, have been most sympathetic and assistful. On both sides of the waters, William Dana Orcutt, Esquire, of The University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Frederick A. Stokes, Esquire, of New York, have added friendship for the cause to much appreciated practical assistance.

      These and many others are preferred-creditors of gratitude, in addition to those whose mention is embodied elsewhere in the various books of the "Series."

      As attempted to be shown in the "A.B. – Z.," under the caption "Bunching Hits and Personal Umpiring," this study of menticulture from the basis of economic and epicurean nutrition, in connection with a purified exterior and interior environment, is "team-work," as in football, cricket, or base-ball, and a laudable enthusiasm is an important feature of the game; hence, to conclude, this especial book, being a personal confession, relaxation, effusion, expansion, as it were, of the practical benefits of economic body nutrition and menti-nutrition, it seems the appropriate place to offer personal tribute outside and inside the intimate family relations, as freely as menticultural impulse may suggest.

HORACE FLETCHER.

      PREFACE

      TO 1906 EDITIONS

      Since the former introductions were written much success has been attained in further advancing the reforms advocated in the A. B. C. Life Series. Professor Chittenden has published his report on the Yale experiments in book form in both America1 and England,2 and his results have been accepted in scientific circles the world over as authoritatively conclusive.

      At the present writing the most important Health Boards of Europe3 are planning to put the new standards of dietary economy into practical use among public charges in a manner that can only result in benefit to the wards of the nations as well as make an important saving to the taxpayers. In the most important of these foreign public health departments the Health Officer of the Board has himself practised the newly established economy for two years, and his plans are formulated on personal experience which fully confirms Professor Chittenden's report and that of the author as herein related.

      At a missionary agricultural college, situated near Nashville, Tenn., where the students earn their tuition and their board while pursuing their studies, a six months' test of what is termed "Fletcherism" resulted in a saving of about one half of the drafts on the commissary, immunity from illness, increased energy, strength and endurance, and general adoption of the suggestions published in the several books of the author included in the A. B. C. Life Series.

      In the various departments and branches of the Battle Creek Sanitarium in America, and widely scattered over the world, some eight hundred employees and thousands of patients have been accumulating evidence of the efficacy of "Fletcherism" for more than three years, and scarce a month passes without a letter from Dr. Kellogg to the author containing new testimony confirming the A. B. C. selections and suggestions.

      The author has received within the past two years more than a thousand letters bearing the approval of the writers with report of benefits received which seem almost miraculous, and these include the leaders in many branches of human occupation – physiologists, surgeons, medical practitioners, artists, business men, literary workers, athletes, working men and women, and almost every degree of mental and physical activity.

      One of the medical advisers of King Edward, of whom the King once said: "He is a splendid doctor but a poor courtier," follows the suggestions of these books in prescribing to his sumptuous clients.

      THE NEW GLUTTON OR EPICURE

      It is now five years since the first section of this crude little announcement of a great physiological discovery was published; and while the author has spent all the intervening years in unremitting study of the subject of which it treats, with the heads of many of the great physiological laboratories of the world assisting him with their best facilities and information, as to the "reasons for things," there is but small correction to make.

      This does not imply that the "last word" upon the subject has been herein stated, or that corrections may not be made as the study progresses, but it means, that as an honest description of an effort to get to understand the natural requirements in our own nutrition, it is perhaps better put than the same author could now do; that is, if intended for the enlightenment of persons whose curiosity has not yet been excited, or whose interest in their nutritive welfare is still young and inexperienced.

      With regard to the statement that "whatever has no taste is not nutritious," copied from a high educational authority, correction certainly must be made. Pure proteid has no perceptible taste as measured by taste-bud appreciation, any more than pure water has specific taste, and yet who may not say that "water tastes good" when one is really thirsty. Taste is a very subtle sense and is closely allied to feeling. Things are often said to taste good because they feel good in the mouth or to the throat as they descend to the stomach.

      Regarding also the advice to remove from the mouth refractory substance that the teeth and saliva cannot reduce to a condition to excite the Swallowing Impulse. There is theoretical and actual nutriment in the cottony fibre of tough lobster, or poor fish, or lean pork, and there is good reason to believe that a strong digestive apparatus can take care of such tough substance after a fashion and get nutriment out of it. In the same way the hard, woody fibre of old nuts is the identical material that was rich in juicy oils and proteid when the nuts were fresh, but if swallowed in the toughened condition that age brings to nuts, it is but slowly reduced in the stomach and intestines and only at enormous expense. If putrifactive bacterial decomposition has to be resorted to to get rid of the stuff the process is then poisonous as well as difficult.

      According to physiological authority which we must, for the moment, accept, proteid is a vitally-necessary material and we cannot afford to waste it. Our life depends upon proteid to replace the waste of muscular tissue which occurs with every movement, but when even good proteid is found by the mouth to be in a form that is too refractory for the teeth to handle, it is poor policy to send it on to the toothless stomach and intestines for the accomplishment of the reduction. If the mouth cannot handle what its guardian senses don't like, it can spit it out and get rid of it immediately; but if the stomach or intestines are afflicted with something that is harder than they can easily take care of, they have to call in the assistance of bacterial scavengers whose method is poisonous decomposition, and whose fee is putridity of odour penetrating the whole system and issuing at every pore, making Cologne water a large commodity even in so-called Polite Society.

      There are discernible in the mouth distinct senses of discrimination against substance that is undesirable for the system. If the mouth senses are permitted to express an opinion, their antipathy is easily read. It is far safer to spit out what the natural impulse of swallowing hesitates at, or fails to suck up with avidity, than it is to force a swallowing to get rid of it simply to satisfy a prudish "table manner" objection. To avoid "impolite" condemnation we really make "hogs of ourselves" "on the sly," and vulgar slang alone is appropriate to express the shameful confession.

      As a matter of fact, if one faithfully practise mouth thoroughness in connection with all his food for a term of a few weeks, he will find that the appetite ceases to invite the sort of things that have to be spit out. The appetite gradually but unfailingly inclines to foods that are profitable all the way through,

1

Physiological Economy in Nutrition: The Frederick A. Stokes Company, New York.

2

William Heinemann: London.

3

The author is not yet permitted to publish the particulars of these reforms in process, but he has official information regarding them and is in full sympathy with them.