Let these stand three days, and when taken, to be well shaken. Dose-One wine glass full three times a day, between meals, and decreasing as the disorder abates. This is said, by some who have tried it, to be a perfect cure.

GENTLEMEN'S CRAVATS. If the cravats which are imported from India are washed in rum, or rum and water, the colors will not fade at all.

DRYING PEARS. When dried in ovens, this fruit will keep for years. This mode of preserving is common in France. In some cantons of that country, the cultivators annually preserve, by these means, supplies of subsistence extremely agreeable and wholesome during winter and spring. In this mode of drying, those varieties of middle size, melting and sweet, are preferred. After the bread is drawn from the oven, they are placed on the swept hearth, or on hurdles or boards. This operation is repeated a second, a third, and even a fourth time, according to their size and the degree of heat. The heat must not be so great as to scorch, and the fruit must not be dried to hardness. Lastly, they are placed in bags, and preserved in a dry place.

The second mode of preserving is practised on the finest-flavored varieties. They are gathered a little before their maturity, and, after being parboiled in a small quantity of water, they are peeled and drained. They are next carried on hurdles to the oven, after the bread is drawn, or the oven is heated to a suitable degree. Here they remain twelve hours, after which they are steeped in the sirup, to which have been added sugar, cinnamon, cloves, and brandy. They are again returned to the oven, which is now heated to a less degree than at first. This operation is thrice repeated, until they are sufficiently dried, or of a clear brown color, and firm, transparent flesh; and, finally, they are packed in boxes lined with paper.

22

OF DIET.

The term assimilation, as used, in its most general sense, by Dr. Prout, has been applied to those processes by which alimentary substances are converted into the organized tissues of the body: primary assimilation comprises those concerned in the conversion of food into blood; secondary assimilation, those by which organized or living textures are formed from the blood, and afterwards redissolved and removed from the system.

Digestion is one of the primary assimilating processes. It comprehends those changes affected on the food in the stomach and intestines, and is partly a mechanical, but principally a chemical process. By digestion, starch is converted into gum and sugar; oily or fatty matters are minutely subdivided, not dissolved; other substances (as fibrine, albumen, caseine, and gluten) are dissolved or liquefied in the stomach. All these processes have been imitated, out of the body, by physicians to determine many facts.

The formation or secretion of the matters necessary to produce the requisite chemical changes in the food, so far as at present known, is a result produced solely by the vital principle. Saccharine inatter, oily or fatty substances, and the finely-divided and dissolved matters, are absorbed.

Two substances are required (an acid and a matter called pepsine by chemists) to dissolve all compounds. The first softens these bodies, and causes them to swell; the second perfects the dissolving or melting process.

The necessity of certain agents in the stomach to effect the solution or liquefaction of the food is obvious; and, if it is admitted that these are formed by the vital powers, it can be readily comprehended how, in certain morbid conditions of the body, the digestive agents are altered in their nature, and the natural and

healthy process of digestion thereby deranged. The digestibility of food is effected by two classes of circumstances, the one relating to the foods themselves, the other to those constituting the state of the individual.

Some foods, as oily or fatty substances, are more difficult to digest than others. There is, however, one form of impaired digestion, says Dr. Combe, in which the fat of bacon is digested with perfect ease, where many other apparently more appropriate articles of food oppress the stomach for hours. Some cases of cholera infantum have been thus treated, where every thing would be rejected from the stomach, except salt pork or fat bacon, rare broiled, and given in small quantities at a time. Many cases have recovered under such treatment, where farinaceous foods could not be retained, or, if retained, passed through the alimentary canal undigested. Vegetables are slower of digestion than meats and farinaceous substances, though they sometimes pass out of the stomach before them in an undigested state.

Tenderness of fibre facilitates the digestive process; and therefore all circumstances which affect the texture of flesh have an influence over its digestibility. Incipient decomposition promotes the tenderness and digestibility of food. Most people are aware that freshkilled meat is tougher than that which has been kept some time. The flesh of young animals is more tender and soluble than that of the full-grown animal; yet the latter is more digestible.

It might be supposed that liquids would be more digestible than solid foods. Dr Beaumont says, "Solid food is sooner disposed of by the stomach than fluid, and its nutritive principles are sooner carried into circulation." Still, exhaustion from abstinence is quicker removed by liquid than solid aliment. Minuteness of division of solids is an important aid to digestion. Potatoes, when cooked so that they fall in pieces, are

more easily digested than when cooked a shorter time, so as to retain their form; and, for the same reason, mealy potatoes are more healthy than waxy ones. Perfect mastication, by effecting the division of food, is an important aid to digestion; and this fact cannot be too strongly urged on the strong, healthy man, and on the pining, miserable dyspeptic. If the food is imperfectly chewed, and hastily swallowed, greater difficulty is experienced in the subsequent operation of digestion. The process of insalivation, as effecting foods, should not be overlooked. When food has been thoroughly intermixed with the saliva of the mouth, it is more readily operated upon by the gastric juice. If dry food be hastily swallowed, without being thus mixed, we instinctively desire drink, to moisten the

mass.

The state of body and mind; constitutional peculiarities; habits; the interval that has elapsed since the preceding meal; the keenness of the appetite; the amount of exercise taken either immediately before or after eating; and the quantity swallowed at one meal, are some of the circumstances relating to the individual, which affect digestion. Violent anger, for instance, disturbs this process; and, in some diseases, accompanied with thirst, dryness of mouth, &c., very little or no gastric juice is secreted. Under such circumstances, food should not be taken; if it be, no nourishment can be obtained from it, while its presence in the stomach is a source of irritation. Considerable difference of opinion exists regarding the influence of repose after eating. Some say exercise promotes digestion; others, again, say it retards it; and both parties appeal to experience in proof of their opinion. After a plentiful repast, all will agree in admitting that the functions of the body are more or less impaired; sluggishness is brought on, and a tendency to repose experienced. These effects are universal in the animal kingdom. We feel them ourselves, we see them in our fellow

men, and we notice them in the inferior animals. The dog, after satisfying his natural appetite, lies down and sleeps; and the boa lies torpid for months, after gorging himself with a goat. These facts are satisfactory proofs to some minds that repose is natural after a hearty meal; and the practice of taking a siesta, or after-dinner nap, is not injurious, if moderately indulged in. The old distich may be considered as reasonable advice:

"After dinner, rest a while;

After supper, walk a mile."

"A diet wholesome in kind, but spare in measure, is essential to the preservation of health among all classes of men. This position, which is so true in itself, is the result of a dissection of man's physical constitution; but true as it may be in principle, and important as it is in its practical consequences, that form of economy which inculcates the spare measure of diet has the semblance of poverty; and poverty, though often the best friend of man, is viewed with abhorrence by almost all the human race, more especially the Anglo-Saxons. Economy, or the proper measure of means to ends, preserves the balance, maintains effective action, and insures prosperity in times and trials of difficulty. Its value is great; but it is not well understood or appreciated; and it cannot be seen by those who consider excess the object and end of their being. A full habit is vulgarly supposed to constitute animal power; and, as a rich diet makes the habit, so high living is, by inference, considered the direct means of attaining high bodily strength."

"The Spartans were abstemious; they were restricted to a diet which the soldiers of the present day would consider coarse and stinted; yet the Spartans were conspicuous for physical strength, and they were, morally, the most resolute military that ever appeared in war. The Swiss occupied a high station among