Grass Eater

England is thickly populated with individualists. Several months ago, a Londoner named J. R. B. Branson wrote to the Times, suggesting that it would be a good idea for Britishers to learn to eat fresh green grass. Mr. Walter Elliott, the British Minister of Health, was not amused. The human stomach, said he stiffly, cannot digest grass.

"A Branson," replied well-stomached Mr. B., "never says can't. ... I have eaten grass mowings regularly for over three years, and off many lawns. The sample I am eating at present comes off a golf green on Mitcham Common."

Mr. Branson took his views to the people, in a little pamphlet entitled Eating for Victory. He cited the researches of Wisconsin scientists, who had discovered enormous quantities of vitamins in powdered grass (TIME, April 22).

When Mr. Branson, a vegetarian, first sampled grass, he had a little trouble with his stomach. A merely temporary obstacle. "I passed down word by 'autosuggestion' to my body-building staff," wrote he, "that I wanted them to sample a new form of 'building material' . . . and I boldly 'steamed ahead.' " Beginning with a few choice blades at each meal, he gradually worked up to over five ounces of fodder a day, can now "fearlessly consume any type of meadow grass." He collects fresh mowings, washes them tenderly, sets them out in the sun to dry, then nibbles them with fruit and cheese, or tosses them up with dressing in a variety of tasty salads. Sample: grass mowings with "broken Dad's Cookie Biscuits and currants"; with equal quantities of rose petals; with uncooked oats. In the fall, he dries and stores his grass as hay. He never cheats by cooking it.

Mr. Branson is now at the age of "67 off." He claims that grass eating has enhanced his "activity, vitality, enthusiasm and vigor," so that he cycles "100 miles a day without any exhaustion." But he warned his readers to go slow. To an inexperienced stomach, said he, grass brings "super-purgation."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.