Vinegar we now speak of as a condiment, occasionally used. When in a perfect state, it is scarcely ever, in a moderate quantity, injurious. Even the most acid stomachs, and pregnant women most injured by aces-cents, may use it with safety. The fact is, that its ulterior change corrects acidity; and with animal food little injury will result. With vegetables alone it is not so innocent; yet in this way it is rarely taken but by the robust, to whom no diet is particularly inconvenient. Vinegar, as has been observed, renders some gross animal substances more digestible; but others it seems to harden, and to lessen their solubility. Yet we have seldom found it injurious but with shell fish; and oysters, cockles, muscles, crabs, and lobsters, are we think less easily digested when vinegar is added. The three first when pickled are certainly less soluble. The various flavours given to vinegar, which is by this means so infinitely diversified, must not be an object of our attention, for it is still vinegar unaltered in its essential qualities. We know a gentleman who never makes a salad without five kinds of this vegetable acid.

Pickles are little more than vinegar in a solid, and, we may add, in its most inconvenient and indigestible form. These are vegetable substances preserved by means of salt and vinegar; but the salt, in the early part of the process, chiefly hardens and contributes to their preservation. Should the curious reader wish to pursue the subject more closely than our limits will admit, we would refer him to the fourth volume of the Amaeni-tates Academicae, in which he will find (p. 536) an entertaining and a not uninteresting essay "De Ace-tariis,"by M. Van der Burg, in reality by Linnaeus himself.

The simplest form of the acetaria is that of the salad, which takes its name from the ingredient, which should be in the least perceptible proportion, salt. The advantages and disadvantages of salads arise from the choice. The lettuce is soporific, the endive and celery acrimonious; but the power of the first is inconsiderable, of the latter lessened or destroyed by blanching { etiolation). The young mustard, the cresses, and the water cresses, are warmer; but these will be spoken of under another head. In general, salads to the young and strong are extremely wholesome, and excellent correctors of alkalescency. In the weaker stomachs, the addition of mustard renders them less inconvenient, though the coldness is often troublesome. Sliced cucumber can seldom be rendered digestible, even by the warmest spices, except in young and robust stomachs.

Vegetables which are preserved by vinegar are chiefly those which are smooth, tasteless, and tolerably firm. Modern luxury flavours them highly with shalot, gar lic, or the seeds of the nasturtium, and with advantage. The mango, the Indian plum, is highly flavoured with garlic; and we emulate it in a similar preparation of the unripe melon. The yellow and the warmer pickles of the East and West Indies we also imitate by the admixture of a variety of substances, preserved and flavoured in the same way, styled pickalilla. The warmth of the West India pickle we obtain by the addition of the capsicum, raised in our green houses.

The pickles of our own climate are chiefly the cabbage, red or white, rendered yellow by art; the young cucumbers (gerkins,) the larger cucumbers, or unripe melons (mangos,) the unripe walnuts, the naturally acid gooseberries, berberries, lemons, the samphire (crithmum maritimum Lin.), the buds of the capparis, the tops of broccoli, sliced beet root, etc. In general, the firmer vegetables are the least wholesome; and those, without the additional warmth of other vegetable substances or spices, often produce inconvenience in weak stomachs. Perhaps, in general, they are injurious by exciting a false appetite, without carrying with them sufficient correction.

Spices are more harmless condiments; since, if they contribute to convey a larger proportion of nutriment, they warm the stomach, and enable it to perform its office more perfectly. It must be indeed admitted, that the organ will be ultimately weakened by over distention; but if not greatly abused, the use of spices does no real nor permanent injury. The safest of the spices is, apparently, the common pepper. It is at the same. time the most durable and inflammatory; but the quantity employed renders the last quality of little effect. The Cayenne pepper is more pungent, but more transitory in its stimulus; and we have had great reason to think that much of its warmth is lost on the throat and fauces. Ginger is peculiarly warm, and its warmth is permanently exerted in the stomach, which renders it an excellent addition to cold and flatulent drinks. The warmth of cloves is more inflammatory, and in a small proportion not unpleasant. Mace is milder; but, from its strong flavour, is used in too small a quantity to be either useful or injurious. The capsicum and chili, though scarcely meriting the name of spice, as void of aroma, are, in qualities and botanical analogy, nearly related to Cayenne. The pimento, uniting the flavour of different spices, seems also to unite their qualities; and the cinnamon, chiefly employed for its flavour, unless used medicinally, has little pretensions to either praise or blame.

Wine must be reckoned among the condiments; for though its addition to sauces is in too small a proportion to produce any considerable effect; yet it is often drunk at table, and adds to the inclination for an additional quantity of food, and the power of the stomach to digest it. This advantage, if it may be styled one, is chiefly obtained by the drier and stronger wines, as Madeira, sherry, and white port; more effectually by the strong and sharp wines, as rhenish, vin de grave, and old hock. The sweeter wines pall the appetite, and are reserved for the dessert, whose sweetness would destroy the flavour of the others. We then find the Malmsey, Madeira, the Frontiniac, Tokay, and Cape wines, introduced. This finishes the studied luxury of a modern 3P 2 dinner, where every thing is nicely calculated to add to the quantity, since the second is more poignant than the first course, and the dessert more attractive than the second: the wine joins in the conspiracy against the powers of the stomach, which is thus daily undermined, and its tone gradually destroyed. Wine is perhaps sometimes really useful in this view; we mean, in some instances where the stomach requires the assistance of a stimulus to take even the necessary quantity; and in such cases it may be even taken with advantage before dinner. In this situation hock is preferable: the next is Madeira; sherry, white and red port, follow in succession. When the whole body is exhausted also by fatigue, the stomach will often refuse the necessary food, until it is a little revived by a glass of wine.