in Venice Preserved, or an obese lago, are
impossibilities. Assuredly, Falstaff was not
scrupulously honest or honourable; but what
was he, after all, but a merry rogue? Plumpness
and beauty have often been regarded
as inseparable Siamese twins, from the
illustrious regent whose ideal of female
loveliness was summed up in "fat, fair, and
forty," to the Egyptians who fattened their
dames systematically, by making them sit in
a bath of chicken-broth; the etiquette being
that the lady under treatment is to eat, while
sitting in the broth-bath, one whole chicken
of the number of those of which the bath was
made, and that she is to repeat both bath and
dose for many days. A doubt, one should
think, must have sometimes arisen, whether
the beauty thus in training would fatten or
choke first.

As to the question of who would be most
likely to sink or swim, on getting into hot
water or falling upon troublesome times, the
lean person would have no chance against the
fat one. Byron, certainly, fretted over his
increasing bulk; and the same gracious
prince, who admired rotundity in his
favourites, had such a horror of the consciousness
of his own corpulence, that "Who's your
fat friend?" was the most severe aside-
speech that poor discarded Brummel could
make, in revenge for being cut by his former
patron.

A book has been written by a Dr. Dancel,
(a medical practitioner, of Paris,—where
possibly gastronomic luxuries tend to produce
the malady he successfully combats)
in which, to be or not to be, fat, is treated
as the grand question of human life. The
epitome of welfare, is leanness; while the
origin of evil, nay, evil itself, is fat.
Professional unfatteners would make Pope's
Universal Prayer commence with the aspiration,
O, that this too, too solid flesh would
melt!" I am not writing under the influence
of Brillat-Savarin's chapters on obesity,—its
causes, and so on,—which are only pleasant
trifling, though with a foundation of truth;
but I rise from the perusal of a serious
business-like volume; and, after a glance at
my own personal points, I thank my stars
that I am not what can be really called stout.

For, it appears, it is only a vulgar error to
believe that an increase of what is called
good plight is any symptom of improving
health. As an over-sanguine temperament is
dangerous; as daily accidents occur from the
undue predominance of the nervous system,
so does the extraordinary development of fat
cause first inconvenience, then infirmities, and
finally constitutes a malady hitherto
considered incurable, and known as obesity. To
men, it is true, personal grace is not
indispensable to happiness; but, with women, the
case is different. Dr. Dancel reminds them that
when once they have lost their personal attractions,
their intellectual treasures serve merely
to render them just supportable in society.

Beware, therefore, ladies how you grow too
fat! And you also; gentlemen, for your
pockets' sake.

Fat has ruined the prospects of many a
man, as of many a woman, by rendering it
impossible for them to continue a profession
which afforded them an honourable livelihood.
The infantry officer, overwhelmed with
embonpoint, cannot follow his regiment; the
cavalry officer cannot perform his duty on
horseback. The dramatic artist whose voice
or whose personal beauty is as good as a
gold-mine to the theatre that has engaged
him, falls into poverty if an avalanche of
tallow clogs the powerful lungs, pads the
slender waist, and renders shapeless the
graceful arms and legs. Stout rope-dancers
are soon laid flat on their backs; over-grown
gamekeepers are only fit for targets to be shot
at, as practice, by juvenile sportsmen. Persons
who live by mental labour find their faculties
clouded by the increase of the corporeal
substance; and literary men—but there is no
need to consider that eventually, because it is
too outrageous a supposition that a man who
earns his bread by his pen should ever have
the time to grow rotund and ponderous. With
publishers, the case is different; often the
publisher sucks the marrow, while the author
is left the bones for his pains. At one epoch,
the Romans, not caring to give house-room
to useless individuals, banished those of their
fellow-citizens who were guilty of the crime
of corpulence.

But all that is a mere nothing. The above
misfortunes are only slight and few. Thus,
embonpoint is a common cause of sterility,
both in man and beast. A fat queen may cause
an ancient dynasty to become extinct, for
want of an heir to the throne. The very
peasants sell off their fat hens, as
unproductive of eggs. Even over-luxuriant plants
produce no flowers, or barren ones. Excess
of fat causes the human epidermis to crack,
mottling the skin with white speckles and
streaks; it induces hernias of various
distressing forms; it is the parent of ulcerated
legs; it gives rise to headaches, giddiness,
and dimness of sight. In short, among
the infinity of causes which originate disease,
a bloated habit of body takes conspicuous
rank, although modern medical works
bestow but little notice on this morbid
disposition. Such evils are often sought to
be remedied by bleeding; but every medical
man is aware that repeated bleedings are
prodigiously conducive to the development of
fat. Certain graziers bleed their oxen and
cows before putting them up to be stall-fed;
while calves have been inured to the operation
from time immemorial. The palliative
of bleeding, therefore, is only temporary;
the more you are bled, the sooner are you
stricken with apoplectic fat. And note this,
for your comfort; fat people attacked by
apoplexy are almost sure to die, while lean
people have a very fair chance of recovery.