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952 T H B ___ lrE _ A.E R [ jg . No^l , ...
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THE CHEMISTRY OF FOOD. The Chemistry ofF...
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THE LIFE AND WORKS OF FULLER. An Essay o...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Toleration Is One Of Those -Virtues Whic...
Blackicood gives us Part V . of " The Athelings , " and Part III . of" Seaside Studies , " which closes the series . We are tempted to borrow one bit of * ' useful information" from this last paper , namely , that Cleopatra ' s celebrated extravagance of dissolving a pearl in her wine is open as an historical fact to this slight objection , that wine will not dissolve pearls : " the most powerful vinegar attacks them but very slowly , and never entirely dissolves them , for the organic matter remains behind in the shape of a spongy mass larger than the original pearl . " Alas ! for History , if Science is to apply its retorts !
" Wayside Songs 13 a series of poems , original and translated , strung on a thread of prose and quotations . " Mr . Buttle ' s Review , " is a notice of some poems by means of a fiction , the humour of -which does not strike us : perhaps because we labour under the misfortune , indicated by Professor Febrier , o having been born south of the Tweed . " Our Tour in the Interior of the Crimea" will be certain to attract readers , and " Family History" is a pleasant review essay .
952 T H B ___ Lre _ A.E R [ Jg . No^L , ...
952 T H B ___ lrE _ A . E R [ jg . No ^ l , Saturday ,
The Chemistry Of Food. The Chemistry Off...
THE CHEMISTRY OF FOOD . The Chemistry ofFood and Diet , with aChapter on Food Adulterations . ( "Qrr'sCircle of the Sciences . " ) Houlston and Stoneman-. EiGHTBENPEN ce will be well bestowed on this volume of popular science . It consists of a translation of Moleschott ' s admirable Lehre der Nahrungsmittel fiir das Vote , and a chapter on " Adulterations , " by Dr . Scoffern . As a question of literary etiquette and commercial propriety , the fact of the translation should have been more emphatically acknowledged ; a line of . small type on a crowded titlepage , which few will read , or , having read , remember ,
is not sufficient announcement . Moleschott will have reason to complain of this , should the translation meet his eye ; and still more wrath will be excited in him by glancing at the first page , where he will find himself made to express opinions diametrically opposed to those for which he has fought and suffered . It i 3 difficult to believe that the translator was ignorant of Moleschott ' s outspoken materialism—which has cost him his professoi'shipand which lie loses no opportunity of enforcing ; yet the translator makes him , by a verbal alteration , express himself in the language of the most orthodox imtnaterialists . Here is the whole passage :.-
—It is a well-known fact , that change of food has transformed the wild cat into the domestic fireside companion : from a carnivorous creature -with short intestines , it has , hy gradually becoming accustomed to another food , become transformed into another being , enabled by a long intestinal canal to digest . vegetable food , -which in its natural state it never touches . Food , therefore , mates of the most lapacious and perfidious animal in the -world an inmate with man , agreeing with children , and rarely , except to a very close observer , revealing its former guileful character . ' Are we then to wonder that tribes of men become ardent or phlegmatic , strong or feeble , courageous or cowardly , thoughtful or unintelligent , according to the different kinds of aliment they take ? If food is transformed into blood , blood into nerve and muscle , bone and brain , must not the ardour of the heart , the strength of the muscles , the firmness of the bones , the activity of the brain , be dependentupcn the constituents of food ?
"Who does not know the debilitating effects of hunger if of long continuance , the uneasiness caused by strong coffee , the stimulus imparted by a good tea ? Who is ignorant how many noble poetical productions owe their origin to draughts of generous wine ? The time is past when it was believed that the mind was perfectly independent of material conditions ; but those times are also passing away in which the immaterial is thought to be degraded , because it manifests itself only by means of the material . The last paragraph will make Moleschott justly indignant . What did he say ? u Die Zeitert si / id v or lei in welckoimaudai Geisi vnabhanaiq wtihite vom literall
"toff" y , " The times are past in which men conceived Mind as independent of Matter . " The translator ' s substitution of " material conditions " seems but slight ; it however paves the way for the next sentence : " But those times also are disappcai'ing in which men fancied that Mind was degraded because it manifested itself only as dependent on Matter — das Geistige erniedrigt glauhteywcil csnur am Stoffsich e'iussert "—which is directly opposed to the translator ' s phrase , where we find " the immaterial"" ( denied altogether by Moleschott ) used as the equivalent of Mind ; and this immaterial is said to manifest itself only by means of the material , which is precisely "what immaterialists maintain , and what Moleschott fiercely
opposes . The public , however , will have reason to thank the translator for the excellent work he has placed within their reach . It begins with a popular exposition o the nature o food , and the physiolog } ' of digestion , secretion , hunger and thirst . It then examines in detail the composition of various kinds of food and their relative nutritiveness : first solid food , next liquid food , and finally condiments such as salt , butter , cheese , vinegar , sugar , spices , & c . Having thus laid a scientific basis , Moleschott proceeds to apply the results to practice , and treats of Diet—first of diet in general , mid next of childhood , youth , maturity , age , of women , of ai'tizans , of literary men , and of invalids . Very interesting to all persons will these pages bo . We extract a specimen : —
DRINKING AT DINNKK . Not ^ seldom do we hear tho opinion advanced , that drinking during a meal is an obnoxious habit , but quite wrongfully ; for tho gastric juico may bo diluted with a considerable quantity of water without losing jts dissolving power in the slightest degree . Duly a superabundance of water would diminish or arrest tho peculiar action of the innttora contained in the digestive fluids . Largo draughts of water , therefore , would ho tho most injurious with nlimonts mmcuit of digestion , liko tho fata ; and honco the drinking of too much water after mt porlc , for instance , is properly avoided ; but , in countries- whoro soup does not constitute a regular part of tho moaldrinking water is positivelto bo recommended
, y . ucor ana win © at ilinnor uto also hurtful only if taken in excess ; for in tho latter cose , the alcohol coagulates tho albuminous substances not onlv of tho food , but also of tho digosuve fluids , and thus disturbs digestion . 1 f taken in a moderate quantity , these beverages are calculated to causo tho meal to hold out longer ; for the fact that wo arc not so aoon hungry again after a meal with wine , than if we have taken only water * ith it , is to bo accounted for by tho alow combustion of fee constituents of our
body , inasmuch as the alcohol we have imbibed takes possession of the inhaled oxvrren Hence , wine with a meal is extremely useful when a long journey or work in haul renders it impossible to take food again at the usual time ; so much the more so a . such detention from food itself usually causes an acceleration of the metainornhosUtf the tissues , which beer and wine efficiently obviate . The subject of " Adulterations" has been so constantly before the public of late that Dr . ScofFern ' s chapter will be read with curiosity . It is verv good , and very temperate . Let us hear him on y
CHICOKY . Chicory cannot be said , I believe , to be more deleterious than coffee , taken dose for dose : coffee , indeed , is the more active substance of the two ; its effects on certain delicate constitutions are so strongly manifested , that , without a violation of language it may almost be designated a weak poison . To raise a special outcry against chicory because of its injurious character on the constitution , is simply absurd " would it ever have been raised , had not the customs receipts on coffee experienced a decrease incompatible with the necessities of the Chancellor of the Exchequer . Unquestionably some palates like chicoiy , others detest it . The philosophic , and ind eed the only practical , way of dealing with cliicory would be to permit its sale—of course , seeing that it is not injurious—but not to permit its sale when mixed -with coffee except the percentage quantity of the mixture be strictly defined . At present the sale of chicory-coffee mixture is regulated on a very objectionable basis . If a purchaser demand to be supplied with coffee , the retailer may deliver a mixture of chicory and coffee
, provided a label expressive of such mixture be attached to the parcel . If the purchaser , however , ask for pure coffee , or coffee unmixed with chicory , tlien it is incumbent on the retailer to heed the request . All this is very objectionable it is an example of the ill-effects of legislating in detail . If , instead of legislating in the specific matter of coffee , some scheme had been adopted of generalizing oh adulterations -a sheme based on some principle which should apply to every case of adulteration-whatever—much confusion -would have been avoided , and public morality , as - well as public hygiene , wmld have been promoted . The present regulations effecting the sale of mixtures of coffee and chicory are very unjust to the purchaser , and provocative of deceit to the retail dealer . Not only is the latter allowed to take adv antage of the purchaser who does not think it necessary to qualify the word coffee by the expletive " pure , " but provided the chicory-coffee sold be enveloped in a paper duly labelled , the dealer may raise the percentage amount of chicory as high as lie pleases ; he is under no legal restraint whatever .
And further on : — Shortly after the chicory-mixing practice became adopted in this country , certain contemplative men began to reflect on the impermeability of tin-plate canisters . Everybody ltnows how desirable it is to retain the aroma in coffee . The best plan of accomplishing this consists in roasting the coffee when wanted , tut the practice hardly accords with our domestic habits and cuisine . The next best plan consists , perhaps , in hermetically soldering the coffee in tin-plate cases ; accordingly the canister project was based upon the principles of true philosophy— -the idea was attractive , its practical application easy : here are sound reasons , therefore , in favour of the canister scheme . But its denouement was heralded by other recommendations . Curiously enough , the exaltation of chicory -was contemporaneous with decadence of alcohol- —canister coffee
was the agent by force of which total abstinence aspired to domination . Evil-minded people , who , knowing that the tin-plate costs money , marvelled not a little that a pound of coffee in tin . should be sold for less than an equal weight of coffee in paper , were told that they knew not the power or the extent of Christian benevolence in well-ordeved minds . The coffee canisters , people were made to understand , originated in no sordid motive of vulgar gain , but sprang , Minerva-like , from the teeming brain of spirithating abstainers—men who so little cared for profits , that they were content to live by the loss . But I seriously doubt whether tin-canisters , if they could s ^ cak , would not proclaim themselves innocent of protecting tho virtues of any one sample of pure cofTee . They are , in sober earnest , mere chicory traps ; and frequently they arc filled in accordance with a nicely calculated scheme of deception , —chicory almost pure at the bottom , and coffee almost pure at the top .
The Life And Works Of Fuller. An Essay O...
THE LIFE AND WORKS OF FULLER . An Essay on the Life and Genius of Thomas Fuller . With Selections from his Writintjs . By Henry Rogers . Longman and Co . Ff we were called upon to lay the first stone of a Mechanics' Institute or Book Society ' s Collection , it should be composed of the hundred and two parts of the Traveller ' s Library . It is the best shilling series extant . The Home and Colonial ranks with it in value , not in cheapness . Here are Mr . Macaulay ' s best writings , tlie anthologia of Sydney Smith , some admirable literary essays by different authors , several excellent volumes of science , narratives of travel in . eight European , four American , four African , and tlmie Asiatic countries , and examples from the works of Souvestre and Duuuis . Round together , tliey form twenty-five convenient volumes , which any society of a hundred and live members may possess , upon payment of one shilling each . An association of this kind , formed in a \ cry small town , would thus create sufficient basis for a free library upon a modest scale . Good books arc not beyond the reach of working men , if working men will combine to obtain them .
Mr . Henry Rogers brings up the rear of about fifty contributors to the Trocella r s Library . His Essay on the Life and Genius of Thomas Fuller , reprinted from the " Edinburgh Review , consists of a biographical sketch , an analytical criticism , and a spicilegium from , the various -writings of ' his author . ' During ten years , from 1831 , Fuller enjoyed a revival . All his principal works were republished in London , and filled nine goodl y volumes . At no time , indued , did he ever fall into disrepute , though he suHerod occasionally from the praise of uncritical admirers . Coleridge , \ yo are afraid , raised many a liuigh against tho Aldwinckle worthy when he drew a coiupa 1 rison between him and Shalcsponre . Mr . Rogers very properly disclaims this suggestion , though , if lie blames the extravagance of Coleridge , he censuros tho neglect of Hallnm , who only alludes incidentally , in his History of European litcraturo , to the works of Thomas Fuller . But ' Ilemy Rogers ' does not care to bo as sharp upon Mr . Ilnllam as ' we' of the Edinburgh llevieio . Therefore , a note is added , to present a contrast to > this fragment of dispraise , in a paragraph of apologetic eulogy . The addendum is not out of plaice . It would liave appeared more gracefully in the orig inal
. Thomas Fuller , born at Aldwinckle in 1608 , was among those men w have not to wuit upon fortune . Fortune waited upon him . At tw elve years of ago he entered college ; at fifteen was a Bnchclor , nt eighteen ft Master of Arts , and at twenty-one a Prebend of Salisbury . It' his prosperity was not always equally rapid , it wn ? pn account of the disturbed state oi
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 4, 1856, page 16, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_04101856/page/16/
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