received and adopted by any society of men without its being apparently salubrious to the great majority of the society. Were it otherwise, the truth would become evident even to the rudest savages; and they would accordingly change their habits, or at least be disposed to do so. But the majority of the society enjoying a portion of health and comfort, with which they are contented, the operation of remote causes escapes observation, and men become exceedingly unwilling to connect their sufferings with the things which constitute a large portion of their enjoyments.

The example of persons arriving at what is deemed extreme old age still further confirms the delusion. How, it is asked, can that be pernicious which persons use, and enjoy good health, perhaps for four-score years and upward? It is, indeed, a wonderful instance of the varieties of the human constitution. But when we see that there are men who use daily large quantities of wine and ardent spirits without apparent detriment*that they carry it even to the extent of daily intoxication with a long-continued impunity-we must confess that these facts. prove nothing more than this astonishing variety. They show us that we are really ignorant of what is the natural duration of human life under the most favorable circumstances. The examples of extraordinary longevity, which some few individuals have been known to attain, show how much we are in the dark

The late Dr. Holyoke, of Salem, Mass., lived to the age 100 years. He was in the habit of being temperate in all things. He was a man of a most remarkable character, never tempted to excess. He used to live without much care, without thinking whether he would do himself harm or not. He was very cheerful, and of a very benevolent heart and easy conscience, and patient of little injuries. He was in the habit of using intoxicating drinks in small quantities. He had a preparation, which consisted of one table-spoonful of Jamaica rum and one tablespoonful of cider, diluted with water, which he used after dinner, while smoking his pipe. I would mention, in connection with this habit, that he did not die of old age. I examined the body myself, with very great care and attention. The heart and organs which are apt to be diseased in aged persons, and to become hardened like stone, were as soft as an infant's, and for aught that appeared, might have gone on another 100 years. And so of the other organs. The liver and brain were in a healthy state. He died of the disease which is most commonly produced by the use of ardent spirits and tobacco-an internal cancer. There was a band three or four inches broad around the stomach, which was schirrous or thickened. I am far from wishing to say any thing to the discredit of the late Dr. Holyoke, who was my personal friend. But if his great age is to be made an argument for the moderate use of spirits, I desire that his schirrous, cancerous stomach should be put alongside of it.-Dr. Pierson's testimony before the Legislature of Mass. See Temverance Journal, 1839, p. 67.-S.

on these subjects. Men have arrived at double, and more than double, what is the greatest common extent of human life. The real wonder, therefore, is that such multitudes perish prematurely.

The effects, therefore, of animal food and other noxious matter, of inducing and accelerating fatal disease, are not immediate but ultimate effects. The immediate effect is to engender a diseased habit or state of constitution, not enough to impede the ordinary occupations of life, but in many to render life itself a long-continued sickness, and to make the great mass of society morbidly susceptible of many passing impressions, which would have no injurious influence upon healthy systems. Even in the early stages of life, the agency of these habits is often sufficiently obvious. It appears in the change of complexion, the falling off of the hair, the decay of the teeth, the impaired power of the senses, as of the hearing and the eyesight, defœdations of the skin, and many other marks of disease, which are as various as the infinitely various constitutions of different individuals. As life proceeds, the resisting powers of the body diminish, and, in consequence, the derangement of the system, produced by the slow but incessant action of morbific causes, becomes more evident. In some, the springs of life are secretly undermined, with little evident derangement of the functions; and such persons are cut off suddenly by acute illness, while enjoying apparent good health. In others, chronic diseases ake pace, perhaps not immediately affecting life, but which, for the most part, increase in severity as years advance. Others, again, sutter lingering diseases, which gradually, but inevitably, terminate in the dissolution of the body.

Such diseases as these, then, must be regarded as the ultimate result of the noxious powers which habitually act upon the body. In all of them, the vitality of the body, or the powers which are essential to the due performance of the functions of life, are radically impaired. The variety of symptoms can be esteemed to be nothing more than the different forms of death, as some organs suffer more than others.

It is much to be regretted that so little can be found in medical writers on the subject of the connection of the diseases with the food, circumstances, and occupations of different nations or classes of society; and still more, that the greater part of what has been said on these subjects is probably erroneous. assertions, made apparently on good authority, are so directly contradictory to the doctrine I have attempted to establish, that I cannot pass them wholly unnoticed.

Some

The Laplanders have been often asserted to be an example of a people living wholly upon animal food, and enjoying under this diet perfect health, and arriving commonly at an extraordinary degree of longevity. The authority of Linnæus is cited in proof of the correctness of these assertions. He has said of the Laplander: "Tu ducis innocentissimos tuos annos ultra centenarium numerum cam facili senectute et summa sanitate. Te latent myriades morborum nobis Europæis communes."

With regard to longevity, no assertions can be depended upon, unless taken from authentic registers, of which, probably, none exist in Lapland. It seems hardly possible that many individuals among this illiterate people could be really acquainted with their own age. And with regard both to health and longevity, the accounts of modern travelers give us no reason to think that this people is peculiarly favored. Acerbi, in his travels, mentions incidentally one young widow, and another paralytic person; and as, in transiently passing through such a country, the opportunities of observation must have been very few, we may fairly conclude that there is, at least, the usual proportion of sick among them.

Still less favorable is the general picture of their habits and manners. The above-mentioned writer describes them as "feeble, awkward, and helpless beings." He says, that "the unsettled and wandering Laplanders are remarkable for sloth and dirt;" that "stupidity, laziness, and beastliness were prominent in all they did, and in all that appertained to them.' And of these tribes it appears that those who subsist by fishing are the most miserable. The account recently published by Von Buch is, if possible, less advantageous than that of Acerbi.

Nor is it true that the Laplanders do not use some vegetable matter in their diet, even daily. They exchange, at the fair of Kantokeino, the skins of their animals for meal among other articles; and Acerbi asserts that "the corn they obtain is converted into flour for their own use, which, through long habit, is become so necessary an article of their subsistence that they are miserable if they have it not all the year round."

Moreover, the herds of rein-deer are milked daily, and therefore much of their subsistence must be drawn from this source. It appears that the milk, by being frozen, is kept perfectly sweet and fit for use during all the winter months. This it is which serves as a substitute for vegetable food. After all, however, it must be allowed that the supply of vegetable food to this people, from their ignorance of agriculture, is very scanty; and

I cannot doubt that they suffer from this cause exceedingly. If, as Linnæus asserts, they are exempt from many European diseases, they are, probably, those proceeding from contagions, which can hardly be kept up in a country so thinly inhabited.

If the doctrine I have maintained be well founded, we ought certainly to expect to find that the inhabitants of those countries which, from their peculiar circumstances, are the most scantily supplied with vegetable food, are the most short-lived. Of these Lapland is the strongest example in Europe; but I know not that there are many registers of the mortality of this people. Next to Lapland, the supply of Iceland is perhaps the most scanty, the country being poor, with little or no agriculture, and receiving all its corn by importation. Accordingly, flesh, fish, and milk (particularly the two latter) are the principal articles of sustenance of the inhabitants, I should, therefore, have confidently expected that in Iceland the duration of life would be relatively small.

But I find it asserted by Dr. Holland, a gentleman who accompanied Sir George Mackenzie in his tour through Iceland, that "a comparison of facts would probably prove that the longevity of the Icelanders rather exceeds than falls short of the average obtained from the continental nations of Europe." This assertion, coming from a member of the profession, and an enlightened man, deserves some consideration.

Fortunately the work from which it is taken furnishes the materials for its refutation, and it shows how little dependence can be placed on hasty and cursory observations, made on subjects with which the writers are perhaps but imperfectly acquainted. Dr. Holland himself has supplied us with a document, an examination of which leads to a conclusion the very reverse of that which the doctor has drawn. From this document it appears that in 1810, Iceland contained 47,207 inhabitants. Of this number there were 1698 between 71 and 80 years of age, inclusive; and the number of persons living, who were still older, was 484. If to this latter number we add a tenth part of the former, for the number who, having passed the age of 79, would be reckoned to have reached 80 (a number which must, in fact, be considerably too large), we shall have a total of 653 persons of 80 years and upward. From this it appears that in Iceland 1 in 70 lives to be 80 years of age. But, according to Dr. Price (see p. 43), even in London 1 in 40 arrives at that age; and in country places in England, a fourteenth, or even less than a twelfth part of the inhabitants have been known to reach this age. We see, therefore, that

Iceland, instead of exceeding other European countries in longevity, falls very short even of the metropolis of England; and we may safely conclude that a diet consisting principally of fish and milk is unfavorable to long life.

I cannot avoid noticing in this place the remarkable fact, recorded in this same work, that at Heimaey, the only one of the Westmann Islands which is inhabited, scarcely a single instance has been known during the last twenty years of a child surviving the period of infancy. In consequence, the population, which does not exceed 200 souls, is entirely kept up by emigration from the main-land of Iceland. The food of these people consists principally of sea-birds-fulmers and puffins (procel laria glacialis and alce arctica of Linnæus). The fulmers they procure in vast abundance, and they use the eggs and flesh of the birds, and salt the latter for their winter food. There are a few cows and sheep on the island, but the inhabitants are said to have no vegetable food.

The disease which principally cuts off the infants is that species of tetanus which has been called trismus infantum. The writer of this account says that the same sea-fowl "is the principal aliment of the people of St. Kilda, the most remote of the western islands of Scotland, which I visited in 1800; a peculiar and fatal disease, which attacks children, is common to both places, and may probably be occasioned by the mode of living."

Norway is a country in the same situation as Iceland. It is said that the greatest part of the soil is incapable of bearing corn; and in consequence the principal dependence for that essential article is on importation. Pasturage affords a large proportion of the subsistence of the people. The housemen, or married laborers, all possess cattle; the poorest have two or three cows; and stores of cheese, salt butter, salt fish, and bacon are laid up for winter provisions. Such kinds of matter therefore form a very considerable proportion of the daily food of the mass, of the inhabitants. From these facts, for which I am indebted to Mr. Malthus, we may conclude that the Norwegians, as a community, use a less proportion of vegetable food than is common in this country; and I should therefore infer from it a more rapid relative mortality. But the account of Mr. Malthus is apparently in contradiction to this inference, for he says of this country, "in common years the mortality is less than in any other country in Europe. The proportion of the annual deaths to the whole population, on an average throughout the whole country, is only as one to forty-eight."

Notwithstanding this apparent contradiction, a more narrow