My meals are very simple, and the simpler they are the better I like them. I like a cold lunch about noon, and a hot meal about six. I have tried a wholly uncooked diet, but as yet my body does not seem ready for it: perhaps it will be after a little while. The first meal usually consists of wholemeal bread and fruit, green or vegetable salads, just according to my needs at the time. In winter I take a more liberal supply of dried fruits and nuts. Pulses I eschew altogether. My second meal consists of a substantial entrée with one or two conservatively cooked vegetables—occasionally I have a soup and a sweet in addition. But of course it is for everyone to find out his or her own ideal diet; and let me say that it is worth while to do so, even though it involves much confusion and perplexity during the period of experimentation.
Wilfred Wellock.
A BALLADE OF SKYFARING.
Ye whom bonds of the city chain,
Yet whose heart must with Nature's be;
Ye who, bound to a bed of pain,
Dream there of torrent and tower and tree,
Here behold them—the magic key,
Turned by a thought in yon gates of blue,
Even now has revealed to me
Alps and Mediterranean too.
Why of the bondage of earth complain?
Wide as heaven is our liberty!
Where are the streets and their smoke and stain
When to the land of the lark we flee?
Where is the sight that we may not see,
Cloudland's citadel passing through?
Switzerland beckons with Sicily,
Alps and Mediterranean too.
Here, 'twixt walls with the marble's vein,
Oared on a river of gold are we;
There we watch, on a sapphire main,
White fleets voyage to victory.
Day unto day flashes grief or glee;
Night to night utters speech anew,
Figuring forest and lane and lea—
Alps and Mediterranean too.
envoy
S. Gertrude Ford.
From Lyric Leaves, by S. Gertrude Ford. Cloth, 2s. 6d. net; 2s. 8d. post free from The Healthy Life, 3 Amen Corner, E.C. This charmingly bound book makes an excellent holiday companion, for it contains many beautiful lyrics, all characterised by serious thought, generous human sympathies and a delicate imaginative quality.