SUMMARY (Ridvan Askin, edited by Deborah Madsen):

Stow discusses raw food and reports on her experience of a vegan life. She notes that there are “a number of raw food disciples in California” (col. 4), quoting extensively their convictions from a letter from an unnamed correspondent, possibly Isaac Rumford (col. 4-5). The correspondent notes some of the struggles experienced by the "Edenic" or raw food community in which they live, including the intermittent reversion to animal food by some members. At the time of writing, the community has adopted the compromise that allows eggs and butter but no animal flesh. This is a practice they are about to discard, however, in favor of food they have planted and grown themselves. The correspondent is a staunch defender of the "natural diet" (the term preferred to "raw food"). The effect of counteracting sexual desire, which meat is notoriously known to stimulate, is particularly noted. According to the correspondent, the natural diet is also conducive to a general state of peacefulness and contentment. Related to the sexual desire provoked by the consumption of flesh, Stow notes “that a woman, after she arrives at pos[t]-maternity is more than defiled who indulges in the procreative act for pleasure” (col. 5). She should devote herself to mature “intellectual pleasures” instead of the "amours of youth" (col. 5).