The articles in The Vegetarian Messenger a century ago were fairly evenly divided between health and moral issues (with more religious comment than is usual today), but one thing that is missing completely is a cookery feature. There are articles on individual foods but recipes, when they are included, are squeezed in at the end, almost as an afterthought. Unlike us, readers then didn't seem to expect seasonal culinary tie-ins either - the few recipes in the December 1894 issue are all for salads, with a complaint that the English: 'make too much of a mixture of our salads, piling up the bowl with mustard and cress, watercress, radishes, chives, celery etc till the original flavour of the lettuce is all but lost.'

As late nineteenth-century vegetarians were living in a world where vegetarianism was relatively new and strange, one would expect a greater emphasis on recipes. Was it taken for granted that all women were sufficiently well-versed in the basics of food preparation and did not need recipes? Or were our predecessors simply not interested in this aspect of vegetarianism, preferring to put all their energies into campaigning for good health and compassion? The December 1894 issue doesn't contain a single word about Christmas festivities but has a long article about the duty of sharing one's sustenance with the poor.

'Testimonies' from individual vegetarians sometimes listed typical menus. Evidently, they lived on much plainer food than we enjoy today. For example, a Mr Ching of Stockwell claimed his diet consisted of: 'Haricots at dinner with other vegetables, potatoes and cabbage, wholemeal bread and butter for tea, breakfast and supper, sometimes with some cheese.' Mr Ching reckoned his occupation was 'not a very laborious one - business hours 8am to 8.30pm' with only a three mile walk to get to and from work! Mr Weatherall of Hartlepool walked or cycled 20 miles a day on a similarly plain diet: 'oatmeal porridge, cup of cocoa and brown bread and butter for breakfast, dinner - whatever vegetables were in season, tea brown bread and butter, fruit and very weak tea.'

The first issue of 1895 opens with another appeal to friends of the Society to rally round and help financially. There's a special offer of 'a parcel of new publications' to be obtained for the price of 10 shillings (50p), the list of titles including: Vegetarianism and the Early Christian Church; Kindness to Animals in Ancient and Modern Times; Saint Monacella's Lambs; Vegetarianism and Peace; The True Purpose of the Animals.

Members are urged to help spread the word by writing to local papers: 'The country newspapers offer a fertile field for the propagation of vegetarian principles. Unlike his town cousin the countryman does not take more papers than he can read. He confines himself, as a rule, to one, and reads it through from the first column to the last. A man who would not trouble to peruse a tract on vegetarianism will willingly read a bright, crisp letter on the subject in his favourite newspaper'

The cruelties of livestock transport were much to the fore in The Vegetarian Messenger. This extract describes the plight of cattle shipped from Ireland to Salford via Liverpool: 'The cattle are overcrowded on board, and if rough weather occurs, they are knocked down and trampled upon, and arrive at Liverpool with bruises and broken ribs and limbs to an extent which often compels the owner to have them slaughtered on the landing stage. Those animals which are strong enough are driven to the railway station and have to undergo a fourth dose of beating to get them into the trucks for Salford. ...[at the market] they remain ten or twelve hours on the hard stones of the pens, and are beaten and prodded by buyers, sellers and drovers the whole day through without having had a wisp of hay or drop of water.'