for eighteen centuries ; whereas of the like case to-day we
should say, Poor thing ! it is pitiful, and forget it in an
hour.



1 88 AT THE APPETITE-CURE



AT THE APPETITE-CURE



THIS establishment s name is Hochberghaus. It is in
Bohemia, a short day s journey from Vienna, and being in
the Austrian Empire is of course a health resort. The
empire is made up of health resorts ; it distributes health to
the whole world. Its waters are all medicinal. They are
bottled and sent throughout the earth ; the natives them
selves drink beer. This is self-sacrifice apparently but
outlanders who have drunk Vienna beer have another idea
about it. Particularly the Pilsner which one gets in a small
cellar up an obscure back lane in the First Bezirk the
name has escaped me, but the place is easily found : You
inquire for the Greek church ; and when you get to it, go
right along by the next house is that little beer-mill. It
is remote from all traffic and all noise ; it is always Sunday
there. There are two small rooms, with low ceilings
supported by massive arches ; the arches and ceilings are
whitewashed, otherwise the rooms would pass for cells in
the dungeons of a bastile. The furniture is plain and cheap,
there is no ornamentation anywhere ; yet it is a heaven for
the self-sacrificers, for the beer there is incomparable ; there
is nothing like it elsewhere in the world. In the first
room you will find twelve or fifteen ladies and gentlemen of
civilian quality ; in the other one a dozen generals and
ambassadors. One may live in Vienna many months and



AT THE APPETITE-CURE 189

not hear of this place ; but having once heard of it and
sampled it, the sampler will afterward infest it.

However, this is all incidental a mere passing note of
gratitude for blessings received it has nothing to do with
my subject. My subject is health resorts. All unhealthy
people ought to domicile themselves in Vienna, and use that
as a base, making flights from time to time to the outlying
resorts, according to need. A flight to Marienbad to get
rid of fat ; a flight to Carlsbad to get rid of rheumatism ; a
flight to Kaltenleutgeben to take the water cure and get rid
of the rest of the diseases. It is all so handy. You can
stand in Vienna and toss a biscuit into Kaltenleutgeben,
with a twelve-inch gun. You can run out thither at any
time of the day ; you go by phenomenally slow trains, and
yet inside of an hour you have exchanged the glare and
swelter of the city for wooded hills, and shady forest paths,
and soft cool airs, and the music of birds, and the repose
and peace of paradise.

And there are plenty of other health resorts at your
service and convenient to get at from Vienna ; charming
places, all of them ; Vienna sits in the centre of a beautiful
world of mountains with now and then a lake and forests ;
in fact, no other city is so fortunately situated.

There is an abundance of health resorts, as I have
said. Among them this place Hochberghaus. It stands
solitary on the top of a densely wooded mountain, and is a
building of great size. It is called the Appetite Anstallt,
and people who have lost their appetites come here to
get them restored. When I arrived I was taken by Professor
Haimberger to his consulting-room and questioned :

* It is six o clock. When did you eat last ?

* At noon.

4 What did you eat ?



190 AT THE APPETITE-CURE

Next to nothing.

* What was on the table ?

* The usual things.

O

4 Chops, chickens, vegetables, and so on ? *

* Yes ; but don t mention them I can t bear it.

* Are you tired of them ?

Oh, utterly. I wish I might never hear of them
again.

* The mere sight of food offends you, does it r *
More, it revolts me.

The doctor considered awhile, then got out a long
menu and ran his eye slowly down it.

I think, said he, that what you need to eat is
but here, choose for yourself.

I glanced at the list, and my stomach threw a hand
spring. Of all the barbarous lay-outs that were ever con
trived, this was the most atrocious. At the top stood
tough, underdone, overdue tripe, garnished with garlic ;
half-way down the bill stoood * young cat ; old cat ;
scrambled cat ; at the bottom stood < sailor-boots, softened
with tallow served raw. The wide intervals of the bill
were packed with dishes calculated to gag a cannibal. I
said :

Doctor, it is not fair to joke over so serious a case as
mine. I came here to get an appetite, not to throw away
the remnant that s left.

He said gravely : * I am not joking ; why should I
joke ?

* But I can t eat these horrors.
< Why not ?

He said it with a naivete that was admirable, whether it
was real or assumed.

4 Why not ? Because why, doctor, for months I



AT THE APPETITE-CURE 191

have seldom been able to endure anything more substantial
than omelettes and custards. These unspeakable dishes of
yours

Oh, you will come to like them. They are very
good. And you must eat them. It is a rule of the place,
and is strict. I cannot permit any departure from it.

I said smiling : l Well, then, doctor, you will have to
permit the departure of the patient. I am going.

He looked hurt, and said in a way which changed the
aspect of tilings :

I am sure you would not do me that injustice. I
accepted you in good faith you will not shame that
confidence. This appetite-cure is my whole living. If
you should go forth from it with the sort of appetite which
you now have, it could become known, and you can see,
yourself, that people would say my cure failed in your case
and hence can fail in other cases. You will not go ; you
will not do me this hurt.

I apologised and said I would stay.

That is right. I was sure you would not go ; it would
take the food from my family s mouths."

Would they mind that ? Do they eat these fiendish
things ?

They ? My family ? His eyes were full of gentle
wonder. Of course not.

Oh, they don t ! Do you ?

1 Certainly not.

* I see. It s another case of a physician who doesn t
take his own medicine.

I don t need it. It is six hours since you lunched.
Will you have supper now or later ?

I am not hungry, but now is as good a time as
any, and I would like to be done with it and have it off



192 AT THE APPETITE-CURE

my mind. It is about my usual time, and regularity is com
manded by all the authorities. Yes, I will try to nibble
a little now I wish a light horsewhipping would answer
instead.

The professor handed me that odious menu.

1 Choose or will you have it later ?

Oh, dear me, show me to my room ; I forgot your
hard rule.

Wait just a moment before you finally decide. There
is another rule. If you choose now, the order will be filled
at once ; but if you wait, you will have to await my
pleasure. You cannot get a dish from that entire bill until
I consent.

All right. Show me to my room, and send the cook
to bed ; there is not going to be any hurry.

The professor took me up one flight of stairs and
showed me into a most inviting and comfortable apartment
consisting of parlour, bedchamber, and bathroom.

The front windows looked out over a far-reaching
spread of green glades and valleys, and tumbled hills clothed
with forests a noble solitude unvexed by the fussy world.
In the parlour were many shelves rilled with books. The
professor said he would now leave me to myself; and
added :

Smoke and read as much as you please, drink all the
water you like. When you get hungry, ring and give
your order, and I will decide whether it shall he filled or
not. Yours is a stubborn, bad case, and I think the first
ourteen dishes in the bill are each and all too delicate for
its needs. I ask you as a favour to restrain yourself and
not call for them.

Restrain myself, is it ? Give yourself no uneasiness.
You are going to save money by me. The idea of coaxing



AT THE APPETITE-CURE 193

a sick man s appetite back with this buzzard-fare is clear
insanity.

I said it with bitterness, for I felt outraged by this calm,
cold talk over these heartless new engines of assassination.
The doctor looked grieved, but not offended. He laid the
bill of fare on the commode at my bed s head, so that it
would be handy, and said :

Yours is not the worst case I have encountered, by any
means ; still it is a bad one and requires robust treatment ;
therefore I shall be gratified if you will restrain yourself
and skip down to No. 15 and begin with that.

Then he left me and I began to undress, for I was dog-
tired and very sleepy. I slept fifteen hours and woke up
finely refreshed at ten the next morning. Vienna coffee !
It was the first thing I thought of that unapproachable
luxury that sumptuous coffee-house coffee, compared with
which all other European coffee and all American hotel
coffee is mere fluid poverty. I rang, and ordered it ; also
Vienna bread, that delicious invention. The servant spoke
through the wicket in the door and said but you know
what he said. He referred me to the bill of fare. I
allowed him to go I had no further use for him.

After the bath I dressed and started for a walk, and got
as far as the door. It was locked on the outside. I rang,
and the servant came and explained that it was another
rule. The seclusion of the patient was required until after
the first meal. I had not been particularly anxious to get
out before ; but it was different now. Being locked in
makes a person wishful to get out. I soon began to find
it difficult to put in the time. At two o clock I had been
twenty-six hours without food. I had been growing
hungry for some time ; I recognised that I was not only
hungry now, but hungry with a strong adjective in front

o



194 AT THE APPETITE-CURE

of it. Yet I was not hungry enough to face the bill ot
fare.

I must put in the time somehow. I would read and
smoke. I did it ; hour by hour. The books were all of
one breed shipwrecks ; people lost in deserts ; people shut
up in caved-in mines ; people starving in besieged cities.
I read about all the revolting dishes that ever famishing
men had stayed their hunger with. During the first hours
these things nauseated me : hours followed in which they
did not so affect me ; still other hours followed in which I
found myself smacking my lips over some tolerably infernal
messes. When I had been without food forty-five hours
I ran eagerly to the bell and ordered the second dish in the
bill, which was a sort of dumplings containing a compost
made of caviar and tar.

It was refused me. During the next fifteen hours
I visited the bell every now and then and ordered a dish
that was further down the list. Always a refusal. But I
was conquering prejudice after prejudice, right along ; I was
making sure progress ; I was creeping up on No. 15 with
deadly certainty, and my heart beat faster and faster, my
hopes rose higher and higher.

At last when food had not passed my lips for sixty
hours, victory was mine, and I ordered No. 15 :

Soft-boiled spring chicken in the egg ; six dozen,
hot and fragrant !

In fifteen minutes it was there ; and the doctor along
with it, rubbing his hands with joy. He said with great
excitement :

* It s a cure, it s a cure ! I knew I could do it. Dear
sir, my grand system never fails never. You ve got your
appetite back you know you have ; say it and make me
happy.



AT THE APPETITE-CURE 195

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 r

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 Haimbcrger 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, break
fast : bad coffee, with condensed milk ; soggy rolls,
crackers, salt fish ; at I 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 1 1 P.M., supper :
tea, with condensed milk, cold tongue, cold ham, pickles,
sea-biscuit, pickled oysters, pickled pig s feet, grilled bones,
golden buck.

02



196 AT THE APPETITE-CURE

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 shipwreck 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.

1 Do you note it well r

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. 1



AT THE APPETITE-CURE 197

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.

* I see. Were they fools ?

* They were human beings.
Is it the same thing ?

* Why do you ask ? You know it yourself. As regards
his health and the rest of the things the average man is
what his environment and his superstitions have made him ;
and their function is to make him an ass. He can t add up
three or four new circumstances together and perceive what
they mean ; it is beyond him. He is not capable of observ
ing for himself ; he has to get everything at second-hand.
If what are miscalled the lower animals were as silly as man
is, they would all perish from the earth in a year.

Those passengers learned no lesson, then ?
1 Not a sign of it. They went to their regular meals in
the English ship, and pretty soon they were nibbling again
nibbling, appetiteless, disgusted with the food, moody,
miserable, half hungry, their outraged stomachs cursing and
swearing and whining and supplicating all day long. And
in vain, for they were the stomachs of fools.
Then, as I understand it, your scheme is
{ Quite simple. Don t eat till you are hungry. If the



198 AT THE APPETITE-CURE

food fails to taste good, fails to satisfy you, rejoice you, comfort
you, don t eat again until you are very hungry. Then it
will rejoice you and do you good, too.

* And I am to observe no regularity, as to hours ?

1 When you are conquering a bad appetite no. After
it is conquered, regularity is no harm, so long as the appetite
remains good. As soon as the appetite wavers, apply the
corrective again which is starvation, long or short according
to the needs of the case.

* The best diet, I suppose I mean the wholesomest

4 All diets are wholesome- Some are wholesomer than
others, but all the ordinary diets are wholesome enough for
the people who use them. Whether the food be fine or
coarse it will taste good and it will nourish if a watch be
kept upon the appetite and a little starvation introduced
every time it weakens. Nansen was used to fine fare, but
when his meals were restricted to bear-meat months at a
time he suffered no damage and no discomfort, because his
appetite was kept at par through the difficulty of getting
his bear-meat regularly.

{ But doctors arrange carefully considered and delicate
diets for invalids.

* They can t help it. The invalid is full of inherited
superstitions and won t starve himself. He believes it would
certainly kill him.

* It would weaken him, wouldn t it ?

* Nothing to hurt. Look at the invalids in our ship
wreck. They lived fifteen days on pinches of raw ham, a
suck at sailor-boots, and general starvation. It weakened
them, but it didn t hurt them. It put them in fine shape
to eat heartily of hearty food and build themselves up to a
condition of robust health. But they did not know enough
to profit by that ; they lost their opportunity ; they remained



AT THE APPETITE-CURE 199

invalids ; it served them right. Do you know the trick that
the health-resort doctors play ?

1 What is it ?

* My system disguised covert starvation. Grape-cure,
bath-cure, mud-cure it is all the same. The grape and
the bath and the mud make a show and do a trifle of the
work the real work is done by the surreptitious starvation.
The patient accustomed to four meals and late hours at
both ends of the day now consider what he has to do at a
health resort. He gets up at 6 in the morning. Eats
one egg. Tramps up and down a promenade two hours
with the other fools. Eats a butterfly. Slowly drinks a
glass of filtered sewage that smells like a buzzard s breath.
Promenades another two hours, but alone ; if you speak to
him he says anxiously, " My water ! I am walking off my
water ! please don t interrupt," and goes stumping along
again. Eats a candied roseleaf. Lies at rest in the silence
and solitude of his room for hours ; mustn t read, mustn t
smoke. The doctor comes and feels of his heart, now, and
his pulse, and thumps his breast and his back and his
stomach, and listens for results through a penny flageolet ;
then orders the man s bath half a degree, Reaumur, cooler
than yesterday. After the bath another egg. A glass of
sewage at three or four in the afternoon, and promenade
solemnly with the other freaks. Dinner at 6 half a
doughnut and a cup of tea. Walk again. Half-past 8,
supper more butterfly ; at 9, to bed. Six weeks of this
regime think of it. It starves a man out and puts him in
splendid condition. It would have the same effect in Lon
don, New York, Jericho anywhere.

4 How long does it take to put a person in condition
here ?

It ought to take but a day or two ; but in fact it takes



200 AT THE APPETITE-CURE

from one to six weeks, according to the character and
mentality of the patient.

How is that ?

* Do you see that crowd of women playing football, and
boxing, and jumping fences yonder ? They have been
here six or seven weeks. They were spectral poor weak
lings when they came. They were accustomed to nibbling
at dainties and delicacies at set hours four times a day, and
they had no appetite for anything. I questioned them, and
then locked them into their rooms the frailest ones to
starve nine or ten hours, the others twelve or fifteen.
Before long they began to beg ; and indeed they suffered
a good deal. They complained of nausea, headache, and so
on. It was good to see them eat when the time was up.
They could not remember when the devouring of a meal had
afforded them such rapture that was their word. Now,
then, that ought to have ended their cure, but it didn t.
They were free to go to any meals in the house, and they
chose their accustomed four. Within a day or two I had to
interfere. Their appetites were weakening. I made them
knock out a meal. That set them up again. Then they
resumed the four. I begged them to learn to knock out a
meal themselves, without waiting for me. Up to a fort
night ago they couldn t ; they really hadn t manhood
enough ; but they were gaining it, and now I think they
are safe. They drop out a meal every now and then of
their own accord. They are in fine condition now, and
they might safely go home, I think, but their confidence is
not quite perfect yet, so they are waiting awhile.

1 Other cases are different ?

{ Oh yes. Sometimes a man learns the whole trick in a
week. Learns to regulate his appetite and keep it in



AT THE APPETITE-CURE 201

perfect order. Learns to drop out a meal with frequency
and not mind it.

But why drop the entire meal out ? Why not a part
of it ?

It s a poor device, and inadequate. If the stomach
doesn t call vigorously with a shout, as you may say it is
better not to pester it but just give it a real rest. Some
people can eat more meals than others, and still thrive.
There are all sorts of people, and all sorts of appetites. I
will show you a man presently who was accustomed to
nibble at eight meals a day. It was beyond the proper gait
of his appetite by two. I have got him down to six a day,
now, and he is all right, and enjoys life. How many meals
do you affect per day ?

Formerly for twenty-two years a meal and a half ;
during the past two years, two and a half: coffee and a roll
at 9, luncheon at I, dinner at 7.30 or 8.

Formerly a meal and a half that is, coffee and a
roll at 9, dinner in the evening, nothing between is
that it ?

Yes.

Why did you add a meal ?

It was the family s idea. They were uneasy. They
thought I was killing myself.

You found a meal and a half per day enough, all
through the twenty-two years ?

< Plenty.

Your present poor condition is due to the extra meal.
Drop it out. You are trying to eat oftener than your
stomach demands. You don t gain, you lose. You eat less
food now, in a day, on two and a half meals, than you
formerly ate on one and a half.



202 AT THE APPETITE-CURE

* True a good deal less ; for in those old days my
dinner was a very sizable thing.

4 Put yourself on a single meal a day, now dinner for
a few days, till you secure a good, sound, regular, trust
worthy appetite, then take to your one and a half perma
nently, and don t listen to the family any more. When
you have any ordinary ailment, particularly of a feverish
sort, eat nothing at all during twenty-four hours. That
will cure it. It will cure the stubbornest cold in the head,
too. No cold in the head can survive twenty-four hours
unmodified starvation.

4 1 know it. I have proved it many a time.



CONCERNING THE JEWS 203



CONCERNING THE JEWS

SOME months ago I published a magazine article l descrip
tive of a remarkable scene in the Imperial Parliament in
Vienna. Since then I have received from Jews in America
several letters of inquiry. They were difficult letters to
answer, for they were not very definite. But at last I have
received a definite one. It is from a lawyer, and he really
asks the questions which the other writers probably believed
they were asking. By help of this text I will do the
best I can to publicly answer this correspondent, and also
the others at the same time apologising for having failed
to reply privately. The lawyer s letter reads as follows :

I have read " Stirring Times in Austria." One point
in particular is of vital import to not a few thousand people,
including myself, being a point about which I have often
wanted to address a question to some disinterested person.
The show of military force in the Austrian Parliament,
which precipitated the riots, was not introduced by any Jew.
No Jew was a member of that body. No Jewish question
was involved in the Ausgleich or in the language proposi
tion. No Jew was insulting anybody. In short, no Jew