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‘Bring on your carrion–I can eat anything in the bill!’

‘Oh, this is noble, this is splendid–but I knew I could do it, the system never fails. How are the birds?’

‘Never was anything so delicious in the world; and yet as a rule I don’t care for game. But don’t interrupt me, don’t–I can’t spare my mouth, I really can’t.’

Then the doctor said:

‘The cure is perfect. There is no more doubt nor danger. Let the poultry alone; I can trust you with a beefsteak, now.’

The beefsteak came–as much as a basketful of it–with potatoes, and Vienna bread and coffee; and I ate a meal then that was worth all the costly preparation I had made for it. And dripped tears of gratitude into the gravy all the time–gratitude to the doctor for putting a little plain common-sense into me when I had been empty of it so many, many years.

II

Thirty years ago Haimberger went off on a long voyage in a sailing-ship. There were fifteen passengers on board. The table-fare was of the regulation pattern of the day: At 7 in the morning, a cup of bad coffee in bed; at 9, breakfast: bad coffee, with condensed milk; soggy rolls, crackers, salt fish; at 1 P.M., luncheon: cold tongue, cold ham, cold corned beef, soggy cold rolls, crackers; 5 P.M., dinner: thick pea soup, salt fish, hot corned beef and sour kraut, boiled pork and beans, pudding; 9 till 11 P.M., supper: tea, with condensed milk, cold tongue, cold ham, pickles, sea-biscuit, pickled oysters, pickled pigs’ feet, grilled bones, golden buck.

At the end of the first week eating had ceased, nibbling had taken its place. The passengers came to the table, but it was partly to put in the time, and partly because the wisdom of the ages commanded them to be regular in their meals. They were tired of the coarse and monotonous fare, and took no interest in it, had no appetite for it. All day and every day they roamed the ship half hungry, plagued by their gnawing stomachs, moody, untalkative, miserable. Among them were three confirmed dyspeptics. These became shadows in the course of three weeks. There was also a bed-ridden invalid; he lived on boiled rice; he could not look at the regular dishes.

Now came shipwrecks and life in open boats, with the usual paucity of food. Provisions ran lower and lower. The appetites improved, then. When nothing was left but raw ham and the ration of that was down to two ounces a day per person, the appetites were perfect. At the end of fifteen days the dyspeptics, the invalid, and the most delicate ladies in the party were chewing sailor-boots in ecstasy, and only complaining because the supply of them was limited. Yet these were the same people who couldn’t endure the ship’s tedious corned beef and sour kraut and other crudities. They were rescued by an English vessel. Within ten days the whole fifteen were in as good condition as they had been when the shipwreck occurred.

‘They had suffered no damage by their adventure,’ said the professor.

‘Do you note that?’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you note it well?’

‘Yes–I think I do.’

‘But you don’t. You hesitate. You don’t rise to the importance of it. I will say it again–with emphasis–not one of them suffered any damage.’

‘Now I begin to see. Yes, it was indeed remarkable.’

‘Nothing of the kind. It was perfectly natural. There was no reason why they should suffer damage. They were undergoing Nature’s Appetite-Cure, the best and wisest in the world.’

‘Is that where you got your idea?’

‘That is where I got it.’

‘It taught those people a valuable lesson.’

‘What makes you think that?’

‘Why shouldn’t I? You seem to think it taught you one.’

‘That is nothing to the point. I am not a fool.’