LEMON. 421 
beneficial against jaundice from torpidity of the biliary functions. 
Lemons furnish, as aforesaid, combinations of potash with 
organic acids—the citrate, malate, and tartrate—which soon 
undergo combustion in the body, and set free their alkaline 
base. Thus these salts tend to promote biliary digestion. 
Again, the fresh juice will serve to stay bleedings, when ice and 
astringent styptics shall have failed; and, if applied externally, 
it will promptly relieve any itching of the skin without soreness. 
For heartburn which comes on from other causes than acid 
fermentation of greasy rich, sweet foods, it is most helpful to 
suck a thin slice of fresh lemon dipped in table salt. The lemon 
juice does not remain acid in the stomach, but presently becomes 
an alkaline base, which neutralizes the gastric excess of acids. 
The first effect is refreshing, and next it proves:sedative. The 
dietetic use of lemon-juice diluted freely with water will obviate 
a liability to gall stones, as frequent experimental use thereof 
has shown. The pips of a fresh lemon, or orange, if bruised 
together with a sufficient quantity of sugar, will serve to extirpate 
worms from the intestines of children. The Chinese method 
of rubbing parts severely neuralgic with the wet surface of half 
a cut lemon is highly-useful. Fresh lemon-juice when squeezed 
out from the fruit, will not keep because of its mucilage, which 
soon ferments. It can be preserved by bringing it to the boiling 
point, and then sealing closely in bottles to protect it from the 
access of air, these bottles being made boiling hot at the time. 
A German professor has shown that lemon-juice has a special 
faculty for destroying the bacillus of diphtheria. He has tried 
this successfully in fifteen acute cases, only one of which died ; 
likewise in eighty other cases of severe sore throat. The diluted 
juice was used as a gargle, and slices of lemon were sucked 
frequently, whilst rejecting the pulp. For a restless person of 
active plethoric circulation, and of ardent temperament, a Lemon 
Squash, unsweetened, of not more than half a tumblerful, is an 
excellent quieting drink at, or towards bedtime; or a whole 
lemon may be made hot on the oven top, being turned from 
time to time, and being put presently when soft, and moist, into 
a teacup ; then by stabbing it about with the blade of a pen knife 
the juice will be let escape, and should be drunk with a little 
hot water, not sweetened. Fresh lemon-juice, diluted so as to 
avoid any smarting effect, is a capital cleanser of the skin. 
Eugene Aram, the Knaresborough schoolmaster, on the eve of 
