The whole time occupied is probably ten minutes. Then after smoking a pipe for ten minute more he is ready for a day of strenuous work. Each man possesses a half-gallon tin bucket, and that is filled at the dairy every morning before breakfast with sweet milk, and that lasts him for the day. No labor is too hard for those men. They can stand any strain put before them and never complain of being hungry. I never heard the least complaint of indigeston, and the doctor would have starved to death if he had depended on these ploughmen for patients. The allowance of meal is seventy pounds every four weeks, and that is all you require to give them. Often these men don’t see a piece of meat in months and very seldom do they eat wheat bread. Scotland has been called the “Land o’ Cakes” from the fact that an excellent cake can be made of oatmeal. The cakes are rolled thin and toasted before an open fire until they are quite hard. I have eaten oatmeal cakes in Virginia that were baked in Scotland, two or three months previously and after being heated through they were as crisp as if newly baked.
I grew up amid these surroundings and am familiar with every detail. I had my porridge twice a day all through my young life, and the development in my individual case was quite satisfactory. I often tell people that I was brought up on oatmeal and the New Testament, which is true; and I can truthfully testify to the excellency of the combination. Another important fact, especially at the present time, is that we never though of adding sugar to our oatmeal. Those ploughmen would have as soon thought of sprinkling epsom salts on their porridge as sugar. To this day nothing gives me such satisfaction at breakfast as a bowl of oatmeal and milk. To eat a bountiful supply of oatmeal and suppliment it with meat, eggs, etc., is a great mistake. It is too nurtitious and impedes digestion. In those days such terms as calorics, protein, carbohydrates were never used and need never be used when speaking of oatmeal. I ask one question: If oatmeal does tnot contain all the elements of a perfect food, how did those ploughmen stand up to their hard work and seldom complain of hunger and more seldom need the services of the doctor? It regulates the intestinal canal like clock work.