But by permitting the inclusion of eggs and milk lacto-vegetarians have deprived themselves of one of the most powerful reasons for disseminating their doctrine - namely, the humanitarian one. Apart from the personal argument, this has always appeared to me to be the strongest motive for the adoption of a fleshless diet. I have great sympathy with the man who, on sentimental, religious, or other grounds, declares that he cannot have anything to do with the death of any animal for his personal comfort; but when I find that he not only uses their skins in the shape of shoes and gloves, but allows the use of their products in the shape of eggs and milk, I realise that whilst claiming its support he has completely cut the ground from under his feet and therefore ought to have abandoned his plea. It almost amounts to equivocation to claim that a large share of the eggs eaten are sterile and hence must necessarily decay, for he must recognise that to obtain eggs and milk at a rate to allow the vendors a profit some animals must be killed. He ought to know that many fowls are fed upon fish offal and much cruelty is practised to compel miserable ailing cows to quadruple their supply of milk. It is only necessary to coop up a poor cow in a close atmosphere and feed it on the refuse from distilleries, sugar refineries, and oil presses to compel it to produce a large quantity of thin and unwholesome lacteal fluid.

Those, too, who, still calling themselves flesh-abstainers, permit themselves fish on the plea that they object to the breeding of animals for human food, cannot surely be aware that nearly all trout, most salmon and oysters, and many other kinds of fish are regularly and constantly increased by the practice of pisciculture. As far as one can judge, nothing but good can accrue to the economy of Nature from the production for human food of eggs, milk, and fish, because it tends to the improvement of the species; but much less can be said of the questionable methods of forcing vegetables, fruits, and cereals of all sorts by doubtful kinds of rapid artificial culture.

The humanitarian argument should cover more than the death of the animal for food, and those who depend upon it are, I believe, consistent enough to object to the death of animals in sport. They are to be commended for this, and, compared with the anti-vivisectors who eat the flesh of animals, they are on a much higher plane of logic. But it is reasonable to suppose that reference to this very question of hunting gives us a clue to the origin of our flesh-eating habits, for it is sometimes difficult for one to reconcile the love of humanity with the innate desire to kill which is present in every man, especially in temperate climes. It is explicable, however, when we reflect that for many hundreds of years man was compelled to live on the products of the chase or starve. In the early history of most temperate countries the land was covered with virgin forests and possessed an inhospitable soil, so that no fruits of any acceptable kinds, few nuts, and certainly no cereals, could possibly be met with. We know that these woods were swarming with animal life, and one can easily see that carnivorism was not a choice but a necessity. It is hardly an answer to this argument to say that man had no need to leave his tropical home, because, so far as we can judge from a comparison of the peoples of the world, his transmigration was an evolutionary necessity. One need only contrast the inhabitants of the torrid zone with those of temperate climes to see that where food is or was easily obtained indolence is the characteristic of the inhabitants, and where it is or was difficult to obtain energy rapidly developed. Besides, there are regions of the earth's surface where no nuts, fruits, or cereals can possibly be grown, as, for example, the Arctic Circle.

It has been urged in opposition to this statement that in the journal kept by the Pilgrim Fathers it is recorded that the aboriginal diet was chiefly corn, beans, and other vegetables, and that in the early summer, when these were exhausted and the flesh of deer, wild turkeys, fresh fish, clams and oysters were substituted, illness quickly broke out and was only quelled on the appearance of the new crops of corn and beans. Apparently the Indians discovered the evils attendant upon too great restriction of the diet and the advantages of a mixed diet, for all through the Central States of North America there still exist to day thousands of so-called garden spots - large clearings made by the Indians and cultivated by them. From these facts it is fairly clear that prior to the period mentioned there must have existed a precibicultural stage, when the conditions obtained which I have depicted.

But critical examination of this argument will reveal that it is by no means so powerful as at first glance it appears, for animals are killed much more expeditiously than would be their lot if they were left to die in a natural manner, and, so far as we know, they are unable to anticipate the approach of death. Both in this country and in America I have made a personal investigation into the statement that slaughtering animals tends to brutalise men and tends to convert them into the most inhuman of monsters. Except in the latter country, where slaughterers are not permitted to serve on juries, I have been unable to discover one single fact in support of such an inconsiderate statement. In England at least, they compare favourably with other sections of the community as regards the frequency of homicide and suicide amongst their members, and I am informed by those who come into contact with them daily that their natural affections are rather increased than diminished by their very necessary though perhaps unfortunate occupation. It is comparatively simple to trace the inception of this cruel slander. It is quite on all fours with the analogous condemnation of the vivi-sector and surgeon as butchers - a statement which is far removed from the truth, and in the eyes of at least one scientist - such as Dr. Kellogg - needs no refutation. His warmhearted admiration for members of the former class is well known, and he himself is a brilliant example of the magnanimous and self-sacrificing surgeon who, but for the public association of his name with flesh-abstinence and his enthusiastic advocacy of its tenets, would be known as one of the most daring, painstaking, and successful surgeons in America.

I frankly admit the cogency of the plea that few persons would continue the use of flesh if they were compelled to kill the animals which they ate, but there are many other disagreeable functions in everyday life which would be deliberately omitted were their vicarious performance not willingly undertaken by more suitable people. However much we may deplore the existence of 100,000 slaughterers in this country alone, the lacto-vegetarian cannot be exonerated from his share of any odium attached to their calling, besides which, the average man or woman has very little compunction in quickly dispatching fish, game, or poultry for food.

It is a remarkable commentary on the humanitarian argument that, should the vegetarian propagandism succeed as the zealots desire, it will more than decimate the animal population of the globe; it will end in extinguishing it, because more and more land will be required for the cultivation of fruits, nuts, and cereals, and in time there will be no available territory for the feeding of cattle. From the humanitarian point of view this would manifestly occasion much sorrow, but it would from the point of view of economics be a cause for great gratification, because it is calculated that a given tract of land will support more than one hundred times as many people if the food be taken at first hand from it than if taken second-hand through the animal body. Even should this estimate err on the side of generosity, obviously the gain from every point of view would be tremendous if we could only be assured that the nutritive requirements of the body could be equally well served by a fleshless regime as by a mixed diet.