Of course the vital heat is not to be confounded with fire; but so much for analogy. So, we are told, the New Hollander goes naked with impunity, while the European shivers in his clothes. The poor man is wont to complain that this is a cold world; and to cold, no less physical than social, we refer directly a great part of our ails.

However, I have not set my heart on that. From the cave we have advanced to roofs of palm leaves, of bark and boughs, of linen woven and stretched, of grass and straw, of boards and shingles, of stones and tiles. Or, what if we had been taken sick? It is never too late to give up our prejudices. Yet some, not wise, go to the other side of the globe, to barbarous and unhealthy regions, and devote themselves to trade for ten or twenty years, in order that they may live,—that is, keep comfortably warm,—and die in New England at last.

In most books, the I, or first person, is omitted; in this it will be retained; that, in respect to egotism, is the main difference. By proper Shelter and Clothing we legitimately retain our own internal heat; but with an excess of these, or of Fuel, that is, with an external heat greater than our own internal, may not cookery properly be said to begin?