sallow complexions, sick headaches, and general ennui for a breezy
interest in life and its abounding pleasures, if they would only take
nature's palpable hint, and enjoy the seasonable food she provides.
Belles can find better cosmetics in the fruit garden than on their
toilet tables, and she who paints her cheeks with the pure, healthful
blood that is made from nature's choicest gifts, and the exercise of
gathering them, can give her lover a kiss that will make him wish for
another.

The famous Dr. Hosack, of New York City, who attended Alexander
Hamilton after he received his fatal wound from Burr, was an
enthusiast on the subject of fruits. It was his custom to terminate
his spring course of lectures with a strawberry festival. "I must let
the class see," he said, "that we are practical as well as
theoretical. Linnaeus cured his gout and protracted his life by eating
strawberries."

"They are a dear article," a friend remarked, "to gratify the
appetites of so many."

"Yes, indeed," replied the doctor, "but from our present mode of
culture they will become cheap."

It is hard to realize how scarce this fruit was sixty or seventy years
ago, but the prediction of the sagacious physician has been verified
even beyond his imagination. Strawberries are raised almost as
abundantly as potatoes, and for a month or more can be eaten as a
cheap and wholesome food by all classes, even the poorest. By a proper
selection of varieties we, in our home, feast upon them six weeks
together, and so might the majority of those whose happy lot is cast