In journeying through foreign lands, especially in the East, the English or American traveler is constantly amazed to observe upon what meagre diet the natives exist. Accustomed to meat at every meal, he sees thousands of people who eat meat perhaps not once a year; used to an abundance of vegetables and fruits of infinite variety, he encounters people who live on two or three vegetables and as many fruits.
In the mines of Hungary, the workers dine on two slices of brown bread and an apple; the Italians are content with a little oil and a handful of macaroni; the Chinese exist almost entirely on rice, and the Arabs will live for weeks on dried dates. The surprise is not so much that these people exist, but that they are healthy and strong.
Doubtless, most of this moderation is due to poverty, since all nationalities soon fall into our ways of eating when they come to these shores, but their self-control is nonetheless proof that much of what we eat is an unnecessary burden to our stomachs. The primary purpose of eating is to sustain life, not to please the taste buds. We need material to replenish the waste of tissue, material to make blood and bone and flesh, and that is all.