CHAPTER XIV 

 THE LEMON {Citrus limonum: Rutacea) 



LEMONS are not often enough used as food, drink, or 

 medicine. There is nothing more wholesome in 

 natural foods, more effective in toning the system and 

 purifying the blood (unless for some special reason the acid 

 is directly prohibited ; see note on potash in Introduction) 

 than this most positive of citrus fruits. It is a special 

 agent with the liver, acting directly upon it and assisting 

 with the proper action of the bowels, cooling the blood 

 and reaching or preventing a long list of ailments which 

 take their rise in disorders of the liver. It is true that the 

 liver may be made torpid by the nerves, which affect it 

 strongly, so that worry, for instance, will partially paralyse 

 its freedom and cause heavy colds and more serious troubles, 

 but whether from improper physical or mental diet — ^from 

 whatever cause — a clogged liver can make one as miserable, 

 as discouraged and ill as one can be and live. If too late 

 to remove the cause the condition should be relieved or 

 it goes further, being, without doubt, the cause of suicides 

 from the resulting mental depression, as well as "death 

 from natural causes," through disordering the functions 

 of other vital organs of the body. Vividly picturesque 

 descriptions of the horrors of these various resulting com- 

 plications may be found in almost any patent medicine 

 circular, for it is upon the liver that the authors of these 

 literary gems place the blame for most of the ills to which 

 flesh is heir. 

 The public is not so apt to seek or dwell upon written 



