or if what we use as food is not pure, neither can our
blood nor our juices be so. If we would but be content with
unadulterated luxuries, we have them at our command; and provided they
are not indulged to excess, are of decided advantage to our health.
Supposing all animal flesh to be good of its kind, there is still
abundant room for selection and choice. Mutton, beef, venison, game,
wild rabbits, fowls, turkies, and various small birds, are preferable to
lamb, veal, pork, young pigs, ducks, geese, and tame rabbits. Beef and
mutton are much easier of digestion and more nutricious than veal and
lamb, especially if not slaughtered before they come to proper maturity.
Nothing arrives at perfection under a stated period of growth, and till
this is attained it will afford only inferior nutriment. If the flesh of
mutton and lamb, beef and veal, are compared, they will be found of a
different texture, and the two young meats of a more stringy indivisible
nature than the others, which makes them harder of digestion. Neither
are their juices so nourishing when digested; as any one at all in the
habit of observing what is passing within and about them will readily
perceive from their own experience. Lamb and veal leave a craving nausea
in the stomach, not perceived after taking other kinds of animal food.
Veal broth soon turns sour by standing, owing to the sugar of milk
contained in the blood of a calf; and the same change takes place in a
weak stomach. Persons in the habit of drinking strong liquors with their
meals, cannot competently judge of such an effect; as these liquors
harden all kinds of animal food, and therefore little distinction can be
perceived amongst them. Pork and young pigs are liable to the same
objections as lamb and veal, but in a greater degree; they are fat and
luscious, but afford no nutriment. Ducks and geese are of a coarse oily
nature, and only fit for very strong stomachs. Tame rabbits are of a
closer heavier texture than wild ones, and hence of inferior quality.
Pigeons are of a hot nature, and should therefore be used sparingly.
Fowls and turkies are of a mild proper nature for food, but the
fattening them in confinement is equally prejudicial, as to other
animals already mentioned. If left at large, well fed with good barley,
and with clean water to drink, they will be little inferior to game.
Barley is preferable to barley meal, as retaining all the natural
qualities of the grain in greater perfe