Beef
In the 19th century, London was the suicide capital of Europe. As early as the 14th Century,though, Froissart described the English as ' a very sad race', which description applied principally to Londoners. The French considered that the London vogue for suicide was owing to 'the affectation of singularity', or maybe, 'from a contempt of death and a disgust of life.' One Frenchman described a London family ' that had not laughed for three generations' , and observed that its citizens committed suicide in the autumn, 'to escape the weather.' Another visitor remarked that self-slaughter was 'no doubt owing to the fog.' He also suggested that beef was another essential cause, since 'its viscous heaviness conveys only bilious and melancholic vapour to the brain'; his diagnosis can be linked to the London superstition that to dream of beef 'denotes the death of a friend or relation.'It was also remarked by Grosley that 'melancholy prevails in London in very familly, in circles, in assemblies, at public and private entertainments..The merry meetings, even of the lowest sort, are dashed with this gloom.' Everything was blamedfor this constant gloom, except, perhaps, for the onerous and exhausting condition of the city itself.

Peter Ackroyd, London.