90 EDIBLE AND MEDICINAL 



" But with what still greater wonder and complacency 

 must every enlightened physician now-a-days contemplate 

 that wholly unexpected and invaluable ally which suffering 

 lungs have recently secured from the iatric liver of the 

 cod. Alere flammam to feed common lamps was, till 

 lately, all it professed to do ; but now its vaunt is, alere 

 vilam to replenish the lamp of life when burning low and 

 threatening to go out. About sixty years have elapsed 

 since Dr. Bardsley first sounded its praises ; but scarce a 

 dozen have passed since it was fairly put upon trial in 

 this country, and everybody now knows the result. Thou- 

 sands of cases hitherto most unpromising, have, under its 

 auspices, suddenly changed their aspect, and looked bright ; 

 here, a fair girl, hastening to decay, had scarcely taken a 

 few doses, when the ominous cough was appeased, she 

 recovered her roses, smiled once more on a reassured 

 family of friends, and went on her way rejoicing ; there a 

 case of graver import, which had whispered death to the 

 inquiring ear, made a stand, rallied, and consumption was, 

 for the time, arrested in mid course ; and again, in pa- 

 tients still further reduced by the blighting malady, the 

 administration of the bland oil was frequently observed to 

 respite, soften, and assuage sufferings beyond its power 

 to remove. Scepticism, by slow degrees, made way to 

 conviction ; and he who, a few years ago, would justly 

 have passed for a quack who should have pretended to 

 cure consumption, is now countenanced everywhere by 

 brother practitioners, who have all the same story to tell, 



