I CONCLUDED my article in the July issue with the statement that I hoped later to deal with other aspects of the subject including the belief that “Vegetarianism would settle the drink question”. I have since been reminded of this by what I saw in one of the most progressive of Midland cities. Had I needed any convincing of the close connection that exists between the consumption of flesh and alcohol and the fact that there is still a “drink question”m I might, by what I saw, have been so convinced.
It was on the occasion of an Ox Roasting Exhibition, which appeared to have attracted not only the most undesirable elements of the neighbourhood but also many school children and youth of all ages. I can only imagine what the degrading Ox Roasting Exhibition was like, but the condition of many of the spectators after leaving the revolting spectacle was most disheartening to anyone wishing to do something to “build a new Jerusalem in Englands green and pleasant land”.
I need say nothing more than remark that I saw more drunken youths between the ages of seventeen and twenty-five in an hour on that Saturday evening than I had seen altogether during the last ten years in the City of Birmingham and its adjacent towns.
I am pleased to say that I have more personal friends among temperance folk than among any other class of people, but I must admit that as a class their corns are the most easily trodden on. The reason I think is clear, they have abandoned the use of alcohol-the most stimulating of liquids-but they still adhere to beef and mutton, the most stimulating of solids, and stimulants ask for stimulants. There are many who would rather lose their right hand than place on the table alcoholic liquors that might prove a temptation to their sons and daughters, while they do not hesitate to offer them stimulants in the form of beef and mutton.
Let one who is used to this form of food for lunch go into a Vegetarian Restaurant and consume twice the amount of nourishment at half the usual cost, and he may be so deceived that he will tell you that “he feels just ready for a beef steak”. In like manner the man who has been in the habit of consuming half a pint of beer and drinks water instead, will not only fail to be satisfied but it may be weeks before he ceases to crave for the stimulant he has become accustomed to.
This truth accounts for the fact that I still have the L5 offered nearly forty years a go for the production of a vegetarian drunkard. It may be asked if drunkards do not come from the ranks of the vegetarians, where do they come from ? Further, did any of my readers ever find a heavy drinker who would refuse the meat and could relish the sweet course ? To get into closer quarters with my temperance friends, I would like to quote a statement made some years ago by a well- known teetotaller.
He stated that “there was not a single argument that could be advanced against the principles of Vegetarianism, and in favour of meat-eating, that could not with equal force be put forward against the abstinence from strong drink, and in favour of moderation.” Without endorsing this statement in its entirety I venture to assert that it contains more philosophy than the majority of my temperance friends dream of, and that it would be difficult to find a weak spot in the argument.
In considering the many parallels that exist between the two movements I would like to mention a few, not of those where my readers are likely to differ, but rather where we may be in accord, for everyone is now in favour of temperance, including the “True Temperance” Society. Teetotallers in the past have had to combat the argument that we could not live and enjoy health without alcohol, and we have marshalled our facts again and again to prove otherwise; and then we have been told “Oh, it may suit you, but it wouldnt suit everybody, I could not do my work without my glass of beer”.
But we have pitied them, believing that they were as deluded with regard to the latter assertion as the former. These are exactly the objections that are now put to the Vegetarians with reference to their mode of living, as if abstinence from the flesh of animals is but a thing of yesterday, when it is as old as the hills.
The argument that only some classes of people can do without it, and only some kinds of work can be accomplished without its assistance, falls to the ground in the light of facts. The enterprising Japanese, the Buddhists of China, the Brahmins and Hindoos of India of India, many Arabs, the famous porters of Turkey and Greece, the Norwegians and Finns, also the Benedictine, Franciscan, Dominican and Trappist monks, numbering collectively hundreds of millions, inhabiting every variety of climate, and engaged in every manner of occupation, practically all live without eating meat.
The conquering soldiers of Rome and Sparta, the athletes and Wrestlers of Greece, also abstained from flesh meat. To say nothing of the increasing army of vegetarians in this country, many now enjoying ripe old age, who testify that they are happier, healthier and more fit than when they fed on animal flesh. Not forgetting the testimony of Sir Isaac Pitman, the inventor of Shorthand, Annie Besant, Bernard Shaw, Leo Tolstoi, Dr. Kellogg, Edison, George Arliss, General Booth, Founder of the Salvation Army, and a host of champions in sport, and heaps of others from all walks of life. In fact, as I heard a smart young lady say recently when shown round a picture gallery of many of the above, “Why, you have bagged all the best”.
We are also told, both as teetotallers and vegetarians, that these are medical questions, and if we find that either meat or alcohol does not agree with us, it is best to abstain, but to make it into a question of principle is silly. Teetotallers will not admit this for a moment with regard to the drink question, and those who are not vegetarians should be equally as charitable in the matter of meat. We have not turned it into a question of principle, but rather it has become to us a great energizing principle, through force of circumstances, and in spite of our possible inclination to cling to the flesh pots of the post.
If it were not for making this article unduly long, no end of parallels might to given between the two reforms, in fact the difficulty is to find a phase of the drink question which has not a parallel from a vegetarian standpoint. A few others may be considered in the September issue.
Rickets is a disease of crowded slum areas, but, wherever conditions comparable to these are reproduced-and this is really accomplished in such a climate as that of England, even in the homes of the wealthy and in the midst of country surroundings-the disease tends to arise.
The food factor plays no part in the origin of the disease. No deficiency or defect of feeding will produce rickets when the child is exposed to bright sunshine and lives much in the open. Over a large area of the globes surface where such conditions prevail, rickets is for all practical purposes unknown. Errors in diet in the East and in the tropics generally, are more common and more gross than in Europe, and the mortality from intestinal infections is often high, but rickets does not result. One the other hand, the best of feeding will not protect the child when it is exposed to the conditions which produce the disease. . . .
The constant conditions which are present when rickets are prevalent are : (1) the breathing of a vitiated atmosphere in close and confined dwelling; (2) the exclusion of sunlight; (3) the lack of opportunity of exercise; (4) damp climates and long winters, notably in the colder northern temperate zones.
Where such conditions prevail rickets will develop in spite of the best of breast feeding. These evil factors produce their chief effect in the young infant immediately it begins to lead a separate existence after birth, at a time when fresh air and free oxygenation of the blood are most essential.
Under such circumstances, Nature rapidly produces the lymphatic, rachitic child, with shallow, quick breathing, holding in strict reserve all its activities, so that no undue demands are made for fresh air and sunshine and abundant movement, which are all so essential to the proper growth and development of the young infant.-DR. J. LAWSON DICK, Rickets.
In an experience of twenty-two years surgery in the Punjab, I have found the following diseases very uncommon : Appendicitis, gastric and duodenal ulcer, acute cholecystitis, gall-stones and their sequelae, and, finally cancer in all its forms. Acute rheumatism is most uncommon; as would be expected, heart disease in any shape is correspondingly rare.
The immunity of the Himalayan peasantry from acute rheumatism, chorea, and endocarditis is most striking. The women toil for hours in the flooded rice fields up to their knees in water in the steady downpour of the rains, wet to the skin, and yet never seem to contract rheumatism. This disease is equally uncommon in the plains, but there the climate is dry.
Henry followed in his father's footsteps, obtaining his Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery from Durham in 1891. At the age of 27 he arrived in Melbourne in April 1894 aboard the Port Albert. He was registered as a medical practitioner in Victoria on 4 May 1894.
It appears that Dr Cook already believed in homœopathy, possibly because of his father's influence, as in 1895 Dr Cook took the position of Resident Surgeon of the Melbourne Homœopathic Hospital . (This position was previously held by Dr James Cook, unrelated, who resigned in March 1895). He was listed in the 1896 & 1897 editions of the Melbourne Post Office Directory as being Resident Medical Officer at the Melbourne Homœopathic Hospital, but not in the 1898 edition.
In 1901 he moved to Sale in Eastern Victoria, where he ran a practice in York Street. By 1909 his practice was at Wyndham Street, Shepparton.
By 1919 he had moved to 2 Studley Park Road, Kew, where he died on 7 May, 1923.