HOT-WEATHER DIET.—The sultry period of our summer, although comparatively slight and of short duration, is nevertheless felt by some people to be extremely oppressive, but this is mainly due to the practice of eating much animal food or fatty matters, conjoined as it often is with the habit of drinking freely of fluids containing more or less alcoholics. Living on cereals, vegetables, and fruits, and abstaining from alcoholic drinks, the same persons would probably enjoy the temperature, and be free from the thirst which is the natural result of consuming needlessly heating food.—Sir Henry Thompson.
Mistress (arranging for dinner)—"Didn't the macaroni come from the grocer's, Bridget?"
Bridget—"Yis, mum, but oi sint it back. Every won av thim leetle stims wuz impty."
Some years since, a great railroad corporation in the West, having occasion to change the gauge of its road throughout a distance of some five hundred miles, employed a force of 3,000 workmen upon the job, who worked from very early in the morning until late at night. Alcoholic drinks were strictly prohibited, but a thin gruel made of oatmeal and water was kept on hand and freely partaken of by the men to quench their thirst. The results were admirable; not a single workmen gave out under the severe strain, and not one lost a day from sickness. Thus this large body of men were kept well and in perfect strength and spirits, and the work was done in considerably less time than that counted on for its completion.
In Scotch households oatmeal porridge is as inevitable as breakfast itself, except perhaps on Sundays, as this anecdote will illustrate. A mother and child were passing along a street in Glasgow, when this conversation was overheard:—
"What day is the morn, mither?"
"Sabbath, laddie."
"An' will wi hae tea to breakfast, mither?"
"Aye, laddie, gin we're spared."
"An' gin we're no spared, will we hae parrich?"