To convey water to the system and relieve thirst. To introduce various salts and organic acids, which improve the quality of the blood and react favorably upon the secretions.

As Antiscorbutics

As diuretics, and to lessen the acidity of the urine. They do this owing to the decomposition of various alkaline salts in the blood or tissues, which are reformed into alkaline carbonates, and as such are excreted. For this reason fruit is good for gout and the gouty diathesis, because it prevents the accumulation of acid urates.

As Laxatives And Cathartics

To stimulate the appetite, improve digestion, and give variety in the diet. As special cures for certain diseases, like the grape-cure, although their specific action is very doubtful. The apple, lime, lemon, and orange have much potash, lime, and magnesia in their composition, and are the antiscorbutic fruits par excellence. Peaches may be added to these. The most nutritious fruits are the sweet and starchy fruits, and are the banana, the fig, the date, the plum, and the grape. The most watery of fruits are the melons, the citrus fruits, as oranges, limes, lemons, and shaddocks, together with grapes.

The ripening of fruit is an interesting process. The absorption of oxygen by the fruit has much to do with it. The contained acids and the tannin are altered by this as time goes on and the as-tringency and the acidity of the fruit decrease, the starch going into levulose or glucose, and the gelatinous pectin is formed. Now, with these the volatile ethers and oils appear, and the fruit is ripe, or fit to eat, and this ripe condition increases until the fermentations of decay start up and the fruit returns to its original elements, just as do all other organic bodies.

Thompson gives the most digestible fruits as grapes, oranges, lemons, cooked apples, figs, peaches, strawberries, and raspberries. I look upon strawberries and raspberries as fruit not to be eaten in too large quantities by the gouty and the rheumatic. The acids of these have less tendency to combine with bases during digestion, and thus they leave more free acid than other fruits to disturb the alkalinity of the blood. Not so digestible as the other fruits given in the list before mentioned are melons, prunes, plums, raw apples, pears, apricots, bananas, and fresh currants. Of course, in all this much depends upon the condition of the fruit as to ripeness, etc., and the idiosyncrasies of the individual. The most useful fruits for invalids are, oranges, lemons, baked apples and pears, peaches, stewed prunes, grapes, and the meal made from the banana, but not the fresh banana, - it is too sweet and too starchy.

Fruit syrups and fruit juices have their place in diet and should be made from fresh fruit. Both are equally good when the materials are in proper condition. Lemonade, orangeade, raspberryade, raspberry vinegar, and such compounds are much used and should be made from the juices of the fresh fruit, when obtainable, especially lemonade. Circus lemonade is made from citric and tartaric acid and colored, perhaps, with some aniline dye to make it pretty. Such a drink has no call for either the sick or the well. For the sick, lemonade and orangeade made from the effervescing waters are among the best and most invigorating, and such drinks should not be overlooked.

Dried fruits are fruits from which the water has been expelled, either by the sun or by artificial heat, and are preserved by their own sugar or glucose. Most of these are bleached by sulphur fumes. While this may do no great harm to them as articles of food, it surely can do no good, and is a trick of the trade that should be stopped.

Preserves we are all familiar with. They are, as a rule, indigestible, containing a large excess of sugar, and are more and more being superseded by canned, tinned, or bottled fruits. Here the fruits are heated to destroy the bacteria present in them and then are hermetically sealed, and will keep in this condition just so long as no fresh air enters to bring new bacteria among them to set up fermentation. Remember one point: After a tin can has been opened, immediately empty it, and keep the contents until used in a china or glass bowl. If left in the can, the contents soon become poisonous and unfit for food. The very finest and best of the fruits, and, in fact, all other articles of food preserved in this way, are done up in glass. They are probably more expensive, but are in every way safer, for there are many reasons why metal cans and metal soldering, together with the acids of the contents, may react on the consumers and produce metallic poisoning, especially lead poisoning. The competition in trade causes many of the canners to use low-grade tin, the tern plate, which is little more than iron with a coating of lead; indeed, in this quality of metal there is little or no tin, and if the cans are recklessly soldered so the solder may enter and mingle with the contents, then doubly unfortunate are those who consume it. Remember as to all preserved, or canned, or otherwise treated fruits, they lack the elements of freshness, and for some unexplained reason they are not nearly so useful as antiscorbutics as are the fresh fruits or vegetables.

To show the importance of fruit to the American people as a part of their diet, let me give a short review, the facts for which I obtain from government publications and my own experience. The early Colonists found here many wild fruits, berries, grapes, and nuts. From these selections were made, and these were cultivated and improved, and foreign slips arid cuttings were planted and grafted. In 1821 about three millions of pounds of dried fruits were imported. Apples were the first fruit we exported successfully-. John Bar-tram, of Philadelphia, the well-known originator of Bartram's Garden at Gray's Ferry in that city, a part of which is the Eastwick property, and now a public park, grew on these grounds the well-known Newtown Pippin apple, which he successfully exported to England by sailing vessels, the trip consuming on an average, for the eastern voyage, forty days. In 1821 we imported over two millions of pounds of raisins. In 1894 California alone exported one hundred and three millions of pounds. It is not generally known that the dried currant as imported is not a true currant, but a small seedless raisin from Greece. They can be grown and cured in California, but the business is not very profitable. Plums are growing to be a large item of fruits in this country, and prunes are already a very large item and are rapidly driving out the foreign product. In 1896 California produced over fifty-five million pounds; to-day the increase is large. Figs are now raised and cured in this country in quite large quantities.