Under What Other Circumstances Would Fruits Aid Digestion?

"Well, fruits to a certain extent supplement the natural gastric secretion, especially in the digestion of tissue-forming food, such as meat, eggs, oysters, peas, beans and wheat gluten. These foods will be more readily digested when acid fruits are eaten with them, provided of course, the stomach is not already too acid."

When Are Fruits Indigestible?

"When they are solid or tough. Green fruit is always more or less solid, and if it is pulled green, it may apparently ripen, but still be exceedingly tough. Fruit of this kind ought to be let alone, unless cooked until soft."

This Would Strike Fruits That Are Shipped Long Distances?

"Yes, peaches and bananas and some other fruits that are shipped a long distance, and ripened in cellars or in boxes, are not suitable to be eaten raw."

Boys Seem To Have A Strange Weakness Tor Green Apples, But The Apples Can Hardly Be Said To Have A Weakness For Boys, Because They Often Lay Them Out. Why Is This?

"Because they are tough and acrid. They are not easily disintegrated, and therefore irritate the lining membrane of the digestive organs, and cause diarrhoea."

Then When Any Kind Of Fruit Is Hard Or Tough It Should Not Be Eaten?

"Not in its raw state, and not when cooked unless it cooks soft."

Is It Proper To Eat Fruit At Meal Times Or Between Meals?

"Fruits that are not very sour may be eaten at meal times with any kind of food. Sour fruit when permissible at all may be eaten with meat, beans, peas, eggs, oysters, but not with milk, bread or vegetable foods containing much starch, such as rice, potatoes and oat-meal."

Does Not The Use Of Fruit Have A Tendency To Increase The Consumption Of Sugar, Which You Say Is Too Great Already?

"It does, but it ought not to be so, for there is no reason or need for covering fruit with sugar as many people do."

"But it is disagreeable to taste and disturbs some people's stomachs."

"As to taste, that is much a matter of habit, for most fresh berries and fruits are better as pulled, than with sugar, and as a rule it is the sugar that disagrees, or if not, it is the tough skin or seeds. Of course, if acids are taken where there is already too much acid in the stomach, that would of itself be a cause for increasing the unfavorable symptoms."

Is There Any Way Of Treating Sour Fruits So As To Make Them Palatable Without Sugar?

"Yes, if it is not desirable to use sugar, bi-carbonate of soda (common baking soda) may be added to sour fruits when cooking. This neutralizes the excessive amount of acid. However, many of the sourest fruits like cranberries should not be used at all by some people, while others may use such fruits with sugar, without any apparent ill results."

You Mention Skins And Pits As Causing Injury?

"Yes, all skins, seeds, especially seeds of any considerable size, should be separated, and never swallowed; but this will receive further mention when we discuss each particular fruit."

Which Of The Fruits Do You Consider Most Valuable?

"In the temperate zones, the apple. The apple is king of fruits, and one is tempted to say of it: Blessed be thy crimson cheek,

Kissed alike by the sun and the breeze; So good, so beautiful, so divinely meek;

There is none thy equal, on earth or seas."

That Is Beautiful, Doctor, And Shows Poetic Genius, But Why Does The Apple So Inspire You? I Hope That You Haven't Been Drinking Apple Jack?

"Well, if the apple be worthy of a place in the songs of Solomon, who says, 'As the apple tree among the trees of the wood, so is my beloved among the sons; and then again he says, 'Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples."

Surely If Solomon Could Say So Much, Why Should Not The Doctor, Who Appreciates Their Excellencies, Be Equally Enthusiastic In Their Praise?

"Then you think Solomon showed his wisdom in so

"Yes, no doubt he could have spoken in still more eloquent terms, could he have tasted some of our Nineteenth century fruit."

I Suppose That One Of The Good Traits Belonging To The Apple Is That We Have It All The Year?

"Yes, that is one, and a very important one. Another is that the apple is the least harmful or misused of all fruit?: for it is seldom used with any serious injury; in other words, it is the least likely to be misused."

What Are The Many Other Good Traits That You Ascribe To The Apple?

"Well, another excellent thins: about the apple is the variety. There are some 300 varieties in cultivation, each different from the other in flavor, and varying from the sweetness of sugar to the sourness of the lemon, or nearly so."

Doctor, What Is The Average Composition Of Apples?

"They vary greatly, ranging from about eighty-two to ninety per cent water. The food elements are principally gum and sugar - the sugar varying according to variety, but it usually runs from five to seven per cent. The apple ordinarily has very little tissue-forming element; it is strictly a heat producer, so far as you could consider it as a food."

What About The Waste Matter Of The Apple?

"It is only about two per cent including the skin and the core, and without these it would be very small, so that the apple is not laxative because of this, for nearly all the vegetables, and for that matter, nearly all foods, have a larger amount of waste matter than the apple has, exclusive of core and skin."

There Must Be Something Else That Makes The Apple So Valuable?

"Yes, its particular effect results from the acids and mineral matter. There is usually about one per cent of malic acid, although of course among the numerous varieties this would vary great1)'. The apple also contains considerable potash and soda, and a trace of lime, magnesium and iron. Some have reported that laborers could live on the apple alone, but we doubt this very much. In this respect, it has rather less tissue-forming food than the potato. Bulk for bulk, the apple is slightly less nutritious than the potato, but its sugar and gum compare favorably with the starch of the potato as a heat producer; but of course the apple, on account of its acids, has many uses entirely unknown to the potato."