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NEW ENGLAND FARMER, 



SEPTEMBER 11, 1833. 



From the Boston ( 'ourier. 

 Dr. WATERHOUSE on MALIGNANT CHOLERA. 



A public caution should not be construed a 

 public alarm. I know not ;i single case of malig- 

 nant cholera in Massachusetts tbe current year, nor 

 do 1 believe that there is a single case of it in all 

 New-England. The \ igilant and wary city of Bos- 

 ton is reaping the reward of its prudence in point 

 of cleanliness, and I believe, sobriety. Neverthe- 

 less it may not be amiss to give a cautionary hint 

 at this season, as it regards the young and the 

 thoughtless on an apparently trivial subject, which 

 depends more on the care of parents than on the 

 the vigilance of tbe public authorities. I allude to 

 the eating of fruit in an unripe state — fruit in its 

 crude, ball" finished state. We include under this 

 head green corn, green apples, pears, melons and 

 cucumbers. 



I am often asked — " Dr. is such and such a 

 fruit wholesome?" I answer "yes, every vegeta- 

 ble carried to market is wholesome, eaten at a 

 proper time of its growth, or, it it grows under 

 ground, prepared by fire in a proper manner." 

 Wo have a little loaf of bread growing a few inches 

 under ground, in vast plenty every where, from 

 Nova Scotia to South America, whence it origin- 

 ally came, with neither useless core, husk or shell, 

 with only a thin skin to keep out the dirt — all the 

 rest beiug a roll, or small loaf of bread ready pre- 

 pared for the embers, tbe pot, or the oven : for 

 who can eat a raw potato ? or earth-apple, as the 

 French call it. We correct in a tew minutes, the 

 disagreeable acrimony of this now universal fruit, 

 by roasting, baking, or boiling, when it becomes 

 the wholesome food of millions. The same prin- 

 ciple should be applied to pumpkins and sipiaslies, 

 and I should think to cucumbers; certainly to raw- 

 corn. I do not say that holy water, but hohj fire 

 must pass through them all, to make them salu- 

 brious. 



Speaking generally, men are preserved in health 

 by eating loholcsome vegetables. And what is meant 

 by a wholesome vegetable ? I answer, a vegetable 

 that is entirely, or wholly ripened, and thoroughly 

 finished, by the operation of tbe sun and air if sus- 

 pended in the atmosphere ; or else, as in the 

 potato, ripened or forwarded by aid of fire; by 

 the art of man — the only cooking animal in crea- 

 tion. Esculent vegetables, that are fully ripe, are 

 pronounced wholesome, because Nature or Provi- 

 dence, two words for the same idea, has completed 

 the process in open sunshine, as in tbe grape, 

 which no one ever thought of boiling. But expe- 

 rience has taught man to expedite ripeness by skil- 

 fully managing' the operations of fire, in a dry or 

 fluid form, as in cooking potatoes, apples, or green 

 corn, by which they are changed, or ripened at 

 once, so that the article which was crude and im- 

 perfect, becomes wholesome by that process. 



An apple, therefore, plucked from tbe tree in a 

 green state, is imperfect and but half-cooked, and 

 every delicate stomach rejects it, and is disposed 

 to rid itself of it by a sense of nausea 01 pain. 

 But tbe stomachs of most young people are made 

 to surmount almost every thing taken into them, 

 yet rarely without some injury. Every growing 

 or unripe fruit, has a vegetative life of its own, 

 which protects it at first from the solvent power 

 of the gastric fluid, as in eating green gooseberries 

 or currants, and some other green fruit ; anil this 

 ill treatment of the stomach and intestines, nani- 

 feats itself to the patient j yet is often surmounted 

 in high health and in a salubrious state of the at- 



mosphere. lint when changed from that to a 

 choleric constitution of the surrounding air, a sin- 

 gle green apple, an ear of corn — a rsel of indi- 

 gestible flour-pastry, may become the exciting cause 

 of cholera ; ami, hum a peculiar anil inscrutable 

 State of it, may assume the Asiatic type of malig- 

 nancy, i [e who feeds on Sesh, uses a final already 

 assimilated to our nature. It is in harmony with 

 our bodies : but he who lakes into bis digestive 

 organs a vegetable, must destroy that vegetable 

 quality, and approximate it to the animal juices-; 

 and the process of animalization in a languid stom- 

 ach is rarely performed without disturbance ; and 

 that molestation invites cholera, when there exists 

 a choleric constitution of the atmosphere. Hence 

 the reader may perceive what a seemingly trifling 

 substance may turn the balance of health in a fas- 

 tidious stomach, and give existence to a rapidly 

 fatal malady, without branding the article eaten 

 with the name of un wholes e. Whence it ap- 

 pears that green apples, coin, or unripe melons 

 taken into tbe stomach in a crude, unripe state, 

 will light up a cholera in a person predisposed to 

 ir, by the peculiar', but unknown internal condition 

 of his body, in co-operation with the equally in- 

 scrutable state of the atmosphere. 



If I have made myself understood in this short 

 essay on a recondite subject, which requires twice 

 as many words to do it justice, the lesson to be 

 drawn from it will be to avoid eating fruit in its 

 green or imperfect state; but correct its unhealthy 

 crudity by the artificial ripening of culinary fire, 

 in boiling, or baking, provided you do not include 

 Hour paste in the mess ; always bearing in mind 

 that whatever causes the sense of sickness, pain, 

 sourness, or eructations of any kind, or a disagree- 

 able sense of fulness — all, or either, are indications 

 that the prime organ of health and comfort, the 

 stomaci, is in a condition to catch the evil tem- 

 perament, or unhealthy state of the atmosphere. 

 And may we always remember that obsta I'RIN- 

 cipiis, is as good a rule in physie, as it is wise in 

 morals. ["Meet the first beginnings of evil : or 

 meet the disorder in the outset."] B. W. 



Cambridge, Aug. 24, 1833. 



EARLY RISING. 



Early rising is a habit so easily acquired, so 

 necessary to the despatch of every business, so ad- 

 vantageous to health, and so important to devotion, 

 that, except in cases of necessity, it cannot be dis- 

 pensed with by any prudent and diligent man. 



Thanks be to the goodness of God, and tbe fos- 

 tering hands of our kind parents, this habit is so 

 formed in some of us, that we should think it a 

 cruel punishment to be confined to our beds after 

 tbe usual hour. Let us prize and preserve this 

 profitable practice ; and let us habituate all our 

 children and servants to consider lying in a bed af- 

 ter daylight, as one of tbe ills of the aged and the 

 sick, and not as an enjoyment to people in a state 

 of perfect health. 



If any of us has been so unfortunate as to have 

 acquired the idle habit of lying late in bed, let us 

 get rid of it. Nothing is easier. A habit is noth- 

 ing but a repetition of single acts; and bad habits 

 are to be broke as they were formed, that is, by 

 degrees. Let a person accustom ed to sleep till 

 eight in the morning, rise the first week in April at 

 a quarter before eight, the second week at hall 

 after seven, tbe third at a quarter after seven, and 

 tbe fourth at seven: let him continue this method 

 till the end of July, subtracting oue quarter' of an 



hour each week from sleep, and be will accom- 

 plish the work that at first sight appears so diffi- 

 cult. It is not a s.iide, it is a succession of short 

 steps, that conveys us from the foot to the top of 

 a mountain. Early rising is a great gain of time; 

 and should tbe learner just now supposed, rise all 

 tbe harvest month at four instead of eight, he 

 would make that mouth equal to five weeks of his 

 former indolent life. 



Country business cannot be despatched without 

 early rising. In spring, summer, and autumn, the 

 cool of the morning is the time both for tbe pleas- 

 ure and riddance of work ; and in the winter, the 

 stores of the year are to be prepared for sale, and 

 carried to market. Tbe crop of next year, too, is 

 to be set or prepared for. Every business worth 

 doing at all, is worth doing well ; and as most busi- 

 nesses consist of a multiplicity of affairs, it is im- 

 possible to desentangle each from another, to put 

 all in a regular train, and to arrange tbe whole so 

 that nothing may be neglc-'ed without coolness 

 and clearness of thinking, as well as indefatigable 

 application. Tbe morning is necessary to all this; 

 and the time and tbe maimer of setting out, gener- 

 ally determines the success or tbe listlessuess of 

 the day. Besides, all businesses are subject to ac- 

 cidents, and to set forward early is to provide for 

 tbe repair, if not for tbe prevention of them. It 

 is a fine saying of Job, 'if in; land cry against 

 me, or the furrows thereof con olain, let thistles 

 grow instead of wheat, and cockle instead of 

 barley.' 



Lying long and late in bed impairs the health, 

 generates diseases, and in the end destroys the 

 lives of multitudes. It is an intemperance of the 

 most pernicious kind, having nothing to recom- 

 mend it, nothing to set against its ten thousand 

 mischievous consequences, for to be asleep is to 

 be dead for tbe time. This tyrannical habit attacks 

 life in its essential power, it makes the blood for- 

 ever its way, and creep lazy along the veins ; it re- 

 laxes the fibres, unstrings the nerves, evaporates 

 the animal spirits, saddens the soul, dulls the fan- 

 cy, subdues and stupifies a man to such a degree, 

 that he, the lord of the creation, hath no appetite for 

 any thingln it, loathes labor, yawns for want of 

 thought, trembles at the sight of a spider, and in 

 t lie absence of that, at the creatures of his own 

 gloomy imagination. In every view therefore, it 

 was wise in the psalmist to say, 'My voice shall 

 be heard in the morning.' 



SKIN AND STOMACH. 



Let these two important organs be attended to 

 in a proper manner, and all the diseases of sum- 

 mer, cholera inclusive, will be avoided. Tbe kind 

 of attention to the skin consists in daily frictions 

 with a coarse towel or flesh brush — the tepid or 

 warm lath twice or at least once a week ; or, in 

 lieu of this, daily sponging the surface with salt 

 and water with the chill taken off it, and then 

 rubbing with a dry coarse towel. Tbe stomach 

 will have justice done it by an avoidance of alco- 

 holic drinks, the moderate use of tea and coffee, if 

 such be habitually taken ; a due proportion of 

 well boiled vegetables, with meat roasted or boiled 

 — and on occasions in sanguine temperament, in a 

 feverish habit of body, a moderate share of ripe 

 cooked fruit — to the exclusion, however, of cher- 

 ries and plums. In all cases where disease is 

 present in a place, no kind of fruit, nor any new 

 or unaccustomed article of diet whatever should 

 be taken in the evening. — Journal of Health. 



