In recent times we hear much of vegetarianism, which has its advocates among many highly intelligent people, and which, as a consequence, has achieved a certain vogue throughout the civilized world. It is rarely the case, however, that those who affect to practice this cult in reality live exclusively on a vegetable diet. As a rule it will be found that they are milk-drinkers, and not infrequently add eggs to their dietary. It is, of course, absurd to regard as vegetarians those who simply avoid meat, since it is true that the nitrogenous substances contained in milk and eggs differ in no essential particular from similar substances found in flesh of all kinds. Experiments on a somewhat extended scale have shown within recent years that young and vigorous individuals at least may live and thrive on a diet composed largely of vegetables; no one has yet shown that a strict vegetable diet is that best adapted to the average individual, and no competent authority on this subject at the present time advocates a diet purely of this kind. It is true that the vegetables ordinarily eaten contain all of the elements that are essential to the animal system, such as starch, sugar, fat and albumins. Unfortunately, however, the amount of the last-named substance is usually so small in food-plants that the quantity that would have to be eaten by a normal individual taking active exercise would cost considerably more than if a reasonable proportion of animal food were included, and--which is of even greater importance--the digestive powers of the individual who attempted to live only on food of this character would be severely taxed, and, in the long run, probably seriously impaired. Furthermore, vegetables and fruits contain substances, usually in great quantity, that are scarcely acted upon at all by the digestive juices. Chief among the latter is cellulose, which, while forming the great bulk of the food of herbivorous animals, is scarcely suited to the weaker digestive capacity of the human being; practically none of it is converted to the uses of the body. It is thus seen that in the average man or woman a dietary consisting largely of vegetables would result in the presence in the intestines of a greater or less bulk of indigestible materials, which could subserve no good purpose other than that they would by their mechanical presence have a tendency to cause the bowels to act; as is the case with fruits, however, it is unfortunately true that this large residue of undigested food, in one way or another, often gives rise to considerable irritation of the mucous membrane of the intestine, and frequently produces dyspeptic disturbances, among which looseness of the bowels is common.