EDITOR'S TABLE. 



123 



will produce a blister. On so sensitive a 

 surface as that of the eye a very small frac- 

 tion of this fraction would do serious mis- 

 chief. W. Mattieu Williams. 

 Stonebrtdge Park, Willesben, I 

 Middlesex, England. f 



GEA.PE3 AS FOOD. 



Messrs. Editors • 



Dr. Oswald's article on "Enteric Dis- 

 orders "(in your issue of December, 1883) 

 recommends the grape-diet. Although the 

 use of the grape is thus frequently extolled 

 in general terms, I find that every individ- 

 ual has his own opinion as to how the fruit 

 should be used. A doctor of standing has 

 assured me that grape-skins were as indi- 

 gestible as hard-boiled white of egg, and fit 

 to be swallowed by no one. Again, I have 

 heard it said that, when the system is in 

 need of an astringent, the tannin in grape- 

 skins answers that want ; while the acid of 

 the pulp and the mechanical irritation of 



the seeds act as mild laxatives. The infer- 

 ence was, that a healthy stomach should re- 

 ceive the whole fruit and keep its normal 

 balance ; as, however, the skin and seeds 

 might be too irritating for a deUcate stom- 

 ach, the balance might still be kept by tak- 

 ing in pulp alone; further, that skin and 

 pulp, or seeds and pulp, should be swallowed 

 according as the system needed an astrin- 

 gent or a laxative diet. Others still would 

 have the seeds as well as the skins rejected, 

 under all circumstances. The same differ- 

 ence of opinion exists as to whether the 

 skins of apples, raw and baked, as well as 

 of plums, pears, and tough-skinned fruits 

 in general, should be taken into a healthy 

 stomach. 



As Dr. Oswald has emphasized the die- 

 tetic value of the grape, it would be a satis- 

 faction to know what, in detail, is his view 

 of its proper use. 



Respectfully yours, 



Sarah U. C. Bolton. 



Greenville, Plitmas County, Cal., | 

 February 23, 18>t. ) 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



PROGRESS AND SOCIAL IMPROVEMENT. 



THE contrasts in the social condition 

 of rich and poor — the lofty, lu- 

 minous mountains of wealth, and the 

 deep, dark valleys of poverty — have ever 

 formed a picturesque subject for rhe- 

 torical treatment, which has always 

 made popular such books as " The Glo- 

 ry and the Shame of England." Mr. 

 George's "Progress and Poverty" viv- 

 idly pictures the social contrasts hut 

 ventures further, and opens the question 

 of causes. He points to the millionaires, 

 and their works, and their ostentation; 

 to the beggars in their wretchedness, 

 and says society is sick, very sick, and 

 growing sicker every day ; and, after 

 sufficiently declaiming over its danger- 

 ous condition, he says, Here is the cause 

 of the malady and this is the pill that 

 will cure it. It had been supposed that 

 social progress involved improvement, 

 through many correlated agencies and 

 by slow methods, but on this theory 

 the sovereign use of Mr. George's pill 

 was not so apparent. So, with a stroke 

 at the close of his book, he smashed 



Darwin with his dawdling evolution, 

 and thus cleared the way for his own 

 prescription to cure the poverty and 

 wretchedness of mankind. 



Yet the rhetorician is not the man to 

 deal with these subjects — except for lit- 

 erary or sensational purposes. A quite 

 different order of mind is required to 

 give us sound instruction upon them. 

 First of all we must know the facts, not 

 in a vague and general way, but ac- 

 curately and in detail, and so classified 

 that their real meanings are unmistak- 

 able. England, as we have intimated, 

 is the country where social contrasts 

 are most striking — where superabound- 

 ing wealth is set ofi" against the ex- 

 tremest destitution, poverty, and squalid 

 wretchedness; and England, therefore, 

 must afford the most terrible example 

 of that alleged downward working of 

 progress, which but continually aggra- 

 vates the evils of poverty. 



It was fitting, therefore, that a wide- 

 ly informed and thoroughly disciplined 

 student of social facts, the President ot 

 the Statistical Society, Dr. Robert Gif- 



