Punch (15.1848)

182

THE VEGETARIAN MOVEMENT.

When we noticed, a week or two ago, a banquet of vegetables, we
were not aware that a great, Vegetarian Movement was going on, with
a vegetarian press, a vagetarian society, a vegetarian boarding-house,
a vegetarian school, two or three vegetarian hotels, a vegetarian
Life Insurance Office, vegetarian letter-paper, vegetarian pens, vege-
tarian wafers, and vegetarian envelopes.

The Vegetarian Advocate has replied to our article on the late
vegetarian banquet, and we must confess that, notwithstanding the
very cholera-inducing diet on which the members of the sect exist, the
answer is by no means of a choleric character. The Vegetarian
Advocate has a delicious vegetable leader, with two or three columns of
provincial intelligence, showing the spread of vegetarian principles.
There are vegetarian missionaries going about, the country inculcating
the doctrine of peas and potatoes; and there is a talk of a vegetarian
dining-room, where there is to be nofhing to eat but potatoes, plain
and mashed, with puddings and pies in all their tempting variety. _

We understand a prize is to be given for the quickest demolition of
the largest quantity of turnips; and a silver medal will be awarded to
the vegetarian who will dispose of one hundred heads of celery with
the utmost celerity. We sincerely hope the puddings will not get into
the heads of our vegetarian friends, and render them pudding-headed;
but they are evidently in earnest; and, if we are disposed to laugh at
them for their excessive indulgence in rice, we suspect that,

Risum teneatls, amici,

will be the only reply they will make to ns

ORIGINAL VEGETARIANS.

THE " FEAST OF REASON " UNDER EXISTING
CIRCUMSTANCES.

Of the thre« grand hygienic questions, " What to Eat, Drink, and
Avoid ? " the Board of Health has very judiciously answered the latter
one. A medical correspondent of the Morning Chronicle has undertaken
to reply to the two former, wisely remarking that " The public should
be tola not only what to eat but what to consume." We subjoin the
dietary proposed by this philosopher, who his given our moraine
contemporary something very much better to chronicle than small
beer:—

"DIET TABLE DURING THE PREVALENCE OF THE EPIDEMIC CHOLERA.

" Bbeakfast.—To eat: Bread baked previous day, toasted bread, biscuit, rusk>
with butter; an egg, boiled 3£ minutes ; mutton chop; cold chic'ten.— To drink :
tea, coffee, milk and water.

" Dinner.—Mutton, boiled or roasted; roast beef; eggs boiled or poached;
b iled or roast fuwl ; tripe; rabbit j minced veal; sago; tap oca ; arrowroot;
semolina; rice; rice-milk; bread; biscuit; light puddings: mealv potaoe".—To
diink: toast-and-water ; weak brandj.and-water; bitter ale ; sherry and-water ;
porter; stout.

" Tea —Bread and butter; dry toast; rusk ; plain seedcake ; biscuit.—To drink :
coffee ; black tea.

" If anything is required for luncheon or supper, it may consist of a few oysters or
a small mutton chop, with bread. A few glasses of good wine, port, sherry, or
madeira, spiced negus, warm brandy or rum and water may be taken, with discretion,
during the day."

Now if the Public should ever die, which of course the British Public
never will, even after stuffing to the extent above prescribed, we will
undertake to write its epitaph, which shall be a slight parody on that
of Queen Katherine upon Cardinal Wohey:—

" He was a man
Of an unbounded stomach."

The foregoing bill of fare is, in fact, the programme of a regular

gorge—of as complete and thorough a blow-out as could be desired by
any living creature of gastric capacity inferior to that of an Alderman
or a Boa Constrictor. Such a banquet might amply satisfy the Sea
Serpent himself. Great as is the gullibility of John Bull, he has never
yet, we are quite sure, been crammed at this rate. If a licensed jester
may appoint a licensed victualler, Punch will nominate the corres-
pondent, of the Morning Chronicle to serve the empire in that capacity.
Gracious! he will make us absolutely a prize people. Our weight—if
we are to be fed by him—will cause every country in Europe to kick
the beam in the scale of nations. What a pity that this gentleman was
not antecedent to old Cornaro ! He might have saved that patriarch
an immensity of self-denial. Why, there is hardly a luxury that he
forbids except cucumber and green apples. He might have regulated
the habits of Justice Greedy himself to the entire sa+isfac'ion of that
worthy magistrate, curtailing him not a jot of his indulgence in

"the substantials, Sir Giles, the stibstantials."

As to ourselves, we will only say that he is the very man that we
should like to a«k us to dinner.

Our own dietetic directions maybe thus brief! v stated:—Eat and
drink as much as is necessary to satisfy jour hunger and thirst, and
avoid everything beyond it.

One thing, however, we will say. The diet-table of the Medical
Adviser of the Morning Chronicle is eminently calculated for adoption in
Union Workhouses, and is likely to prevent'a complaint in those esta-
blishments, which is perhaps even more formidable than the prevalent
epidemic. The best regimen that we have as yet seen prescribed, with
reference to the latter, consists, in its essential element, of that
popular and universally digestible substance—gammon.

WHAT AN IDEA!

We see a new work, advertised under the honoured name of S. T.
Coleridge, entitled The Idea of Life. Now, we want to know which
Idea o' Life this is ? There are so many Ideas of Life !

The'e is the Politician's Idea of Life:—a good cry, a quiet con-
stituency, a friendly newspaper, and a permanent place.

There is the Young Lady's Idea of Life:—pleasant balls, eligible
offers, a good settlement, a place in the Morning Post, and a " fashion-
able circle" to move in.

There is the Man About Town's Idea of Life:—a dog-cart, a cab, and
a park hack, the entree of the coulisses, tick at a tailor's, a good " tap"
of Havannahs, the ri*ht club, and a bowing acquaintance with every-
body.

There is the Gent's Idea of Life, a vernacular version of the last:—
a seat on a drag to Epsom, a lark with " the gals " at the Casino, a
" stunning " choker, Greenwich Fair regularly, a latch-key, and a
good-natured mother, to stand between her boy and the Governor, and
" tip" now and then.

There is the Actor's Idea of Life, in which the great business of the
world is Green-room squabbles, and its great pleasure assisting in
actors' triumphs.

There is the Servant-Girl's Idea of Life :—one long day out with
" the journeyman."

There is the Schoolboy's Idea of Life:— no lessons and free access
to an inexhaustible cake-shop.

There is the Pauper's Id"a of Life—dreary.

The Labourer's Idea of Lie—blank.

The Clergyman's Idea of Life—decorous.

The Attorney's Idea of Life—shrewd.

The Doctor's Idea of Life—deadly.

And there is our Idea of Life, which takes in all these.

And no doubt S. T. Coleridge's takes in ours, And, no doubt,
somebody's takes in his.

Good Gracious ! The Idea of Life ! There must be as many as
there are beings to form them. We haven't an idea how many ideas
there may be on the subject. The idea book!—the idea is perfectly
ridiculous.

A "Kind Undertaking"

At a recent high-life wedding at St. George's, the Post informs us,
that—

" The bridal procession moved to the altar, beaded by the Hon. a id VkRy Kxt.
Henry Pakenhum, Dean of St. Patrick's and Cnrist Church uncle of the biide),
who had kindly undertaken to officiate on the occasion."

Occasionally, when some tremendous tragedian worth £5000 per
annum salary in America— when some such magnificent genius vouch-
safes to appear before the foot-lights in a second-rate part, the con-
descension is announced in the play-bills as a " kind undertaking."
Are we, Dean of St. Patrick's, to take the slang of the Green-room into
the CtiurchP