rand objections against animal food, of almost all sorts,
is, that it tends with such comparative rapidity to decomposition. Such
is at least the case with eggs, flesh, and fish of every kind. The usual
way of preventing the decomposition is by processes scarcely less
hurtful--by the addition of salt, pyroligneous acid, saltpetre, lime,
etc. These, to be sure, prevent putrefaction; but they render every
thing to which they are applied, unless it is the egg, the more
indigestible.

It is a strange taste in mankind, by the way, which leads them to prefer
things in a state of incipient decomposition. And yet such a taste
certainly prevails widely. Many like the flesh beaten; hence the origin
of the cruel practice of the East of whipping animals to death.[22] And
most persons like fresh meat kept till it begins to be _tender_; that
is, begins to putrefy. So most persons like fermented beer better than
that which is unfermented, although fermentation is a step toward
putrefaction; and they like vinegar, too, which is also far advanced in
the same road.

That diseased food causes diseases in the persons who use it, needs not,
one would think, a single testimony; and yet, I will name a few.

Dr. Paris, speaking of fish, says,--"It is not improbable that certain
cutaneous diseases may be produced, or at least aggravated by such
diet." Dr. Dunglison says, bacon and cured meats are often poisonous. He
speaks of the poisonous tendency of eggs, and says that all _made_
dishes are more or less "rebellious." In Aurillac, in France, not many
years since, fifteen or sixteen persons were attacked with symptoms of
cholera after eating the milk of a certain goat. The goat died with
cholera about twenty-four hours after, and two men, no less eminent
than Professors Orfila and Marc, gave it as their undoubted opinion that
the cholera symptoms alluded to, were caused by the milk. I have myself
known oysters at certain times and seasons to produce the same symptoms.
During the progress of a mortal disease among the poultry on Edisto
Island, S. C., in 1837, all the dogs and vultures that tasted of the
flesh of the dead poultry sickened and died. Chrisiston mentions an
instance in which five persons were poisoned by eating beef; and
Dunglison one in which fourteen persons were made sick, and some died,
from eating the meat of a calf. Between the years 1793 and 1827, it is
on record that there were in the kingdom of Wurtemberg alone, no less