"Sluggish;" and was ordered to follow a
course of regimen fitter for some sour
anchorite than for a modern man of the world.
Forewarned as to what part of my friend's
prescription was likely to be, I had taken
the bull by the horns, and said stoutly
that I did not take much exercise, and
that circumstances made it impossible for
me to have more. Thereupon it was
insisted I should become Cornaro and Mr.
Banting figuratively rolled into one. My
food was to be served with rigid plainness,
my times of eating were fixed at
impossible hours; my solids were to be
taken by the ounce, and my liquids in the
way I like them least. With all this, I was
to devote an amount of time to my digestion
and its needs, utterly incompatible
with the business of life. Dining at two,
P.M., I was to eat slowly and rest quietly
after dinner; to chat during that meal, on
light and agreeable topics only; and to
shun all mention or thought of work, as
poison. My evening repast was to be tea
taken at seven o'clock to the minute, with
perhaps an egg or a rasher of bacon as a
relish; and I was to retire to rest in country
air punctually at ten. By following this
advice for a considerable time, my pestilent
liver might become more active; but I
must abide by it rigidly, unless, as the doctor
assured me pleasantly, I wished to be a
valetudinarian for life.

He might as well have told me to climb
a greased pole, or to speak the language of
the Cherokees off-hand. I was living chiefly
at clubs, I dined out a good deal, I followed
a calling especially inimical to regular hours.
I compromised matters by dining at two
o'clock, and at my usual hour of seven as
well. I dined twice a day and got worse.
Meanwhile, I became learned in the
physiology of the human frame. The gastric
juices became my well-known enemies. The
alimentary canal, carbo-hydrates, the
tissues, chyle, deglutition, and mastication,
were all marshalled against me. The effect
of acid in the system, and of want of tone,
the connexion between physical ailments
and mental depression, the precise
symptoms heralding gout, the varieties of
dyspepsia, sleepless nights, aches in the
head, loads on the chest, weariness of the
limbs, dulness of eye, and heaviness of
spirit, were all mine.

Meanwhile, I reverted bitterly to the
far-off days when the first thought was,
not what one would eat, but whether one
would eat at all; of long fasts made for
economy; of resolute abstinence from
luncheons; of cheap banquets of chops and
porter, and of perfect health. Malt liquors
did no harm then, and nothing eatable
disagreed. When you dined out, I said to
myself, regretfully, you took the goods the
gods provided, and were never the worse
for them next day. Pastry? Why you
would go into the nearest confectioner's,
and buying penny puffs, would carry them
off to your chop-house, there to make of
them a second course! Cheese, butter,
crude vegetables? You took them all in
turns, and only did not eat them together
because they were called extras, and
charged for separately in the bill. Sit after
dinner, chat pleasantly during the meal!
How was it with you at the cheap slap-
bang, or when you stood at the counter of
the hot boiled-beef shop, and dined capitally
for eightpence, including carrots and
potatoes, elbowed all the time by clamorous
customers with basins and plates, and
devouring swiftly and in nervous dread lest
some passing acquaintance should see you
through the window? You wiped your
mouth furtively before you left, and assumed
a lounging air as you turned into the
street, keeping your hand in your pocket,
to look as if you'd been asking for change,
and prepared with a jocular answer if any
friendly busybody suddenly demanded what
you were doing there! Salt beef is one of
the things you are warned against now,
even with the accompaniment of light and
pleasing talk; though you could eat it with
impunity when ragged boys and frowsy
slatterns from adjacent garrets, grumbling
to the man behind the counter at what they
called short weight, furnished the only
conversation you heard. Fried fish is bad, is
it—I went on sardonically—and pickles
unwholesome? Yet there used to be a shilling
mid-day ordinary at a tavern in the Strand
where the edge of your appetite was always
dulled by skate and salt butter, and where
you brought it round in time for the sodden
joint by furtively administering to yourself
walnuts and strong vinegar. Your highness
is not to fast more than a certain
number of hours! Yet when you had to
choose between dinner and lunch, and were
not able to afford both, you contrived to
fast without serious inconvenience. Your
appetite never out-stayed itself then. Your
envious hunger at mid-day, when some of
your wealthier fellow-students had cutlets
or steaks sent in from a tavern near, and
when the savoury steam brought tears of
longing into your eyes; this hunger only
increased by night, or if you gave way