ting, seems to be entitled to very little weight.

This conclusion is stated with the more confidence, from the fact that
some of the best medical writers, not only of ancient times, but of the
present day, appear to entertain serious doubts in regard to the
soundness of the popular opinion in favor of the "beef-steak-and-porter"
system of curing scrofulous patients. Dr. Clark, in the progress of his
"Treatise on Consumption," almost expresses a belief that a judicious
vegetable diet is preferable even for the scrofulous. He would not, of
course, recommend a diet of _crude_ vegetables, but one, rather, which
would partake largely of farinaceous grains and fruits. Nor do I suppose
he would, in every case, entirely exclude milk.

Dr. Cheyne, in his writings, not only gives it as his opinion that a
milk diet, long continued, or a milk and vegetable diet and mild
mercurials, are the best means of curing scrofula; but he also says,
expressly, that "in all countries where animal food and strong fermented
liquors are too freely used, there is scarcely an individual that hath
not scrofulous glands." A sad story to relate, or to read! But, Dr.
Lambe, of London, and other British physicians, entertain similar
sentiments; and Dr. Lambe practices medicine largely, while entertaining
these sentiments. I could mention more than one distinguished physician,
in Boston and elsewhere, who prescribes a vegetable and milk diet in
scrofula.

But, granting even the most that the friends of animal food can claim,
what would the case of Dr. Preston prove? That the healthy are ever
injured by the vegetable system? By no means. That the sickly would
generally be? Certainly not. Dr. Preston himself even specifies one
disease, in which he thinks a vegetable diet would be useful. What,
then, is the bearing of _this single and singular case_? Why, at the
most, it only shows that there are some forms of dyspepsia which require
animal food. Dr. Preston does not produce a single fact unfavorable to a
diet exclusively vegetable for the healthy.[4]

It is also worthy of particular notice, that not a fact is brought, or
an experiment related, in a list of from thirty to forty cases, reported
too by medical men, which goes to prove that any injury has arisen to
the healthy, from laying aside the use of animal food. This kind of
information, though not the principal thing, was at least a secondary
object with Dr. North; as we see by his questions, which