here was no food for six weeks, and Nature made most of
her opportunity, not only to cure the acute disease, but also the
chronic disease, which for nearly ten years since has remained cured.

I was summoned to Asheville, N. C., to see a young man in the last stage
of consumption. I found him nearly a skeleton, though he had been eating
six times daily for several months by the decree of a really learned
physician. The belchings from gas were loud and frequent; the sputa by
actual measure was about six ounces during every twenty-four hours.

A fast was ordered, and on the third day a mass of undigested food was
thrown up. As soon as the stomach and bowels became empty there was
comfort all along the line, and the cough was so diminished, that less
than an ounce of sputa was raised in twenty-four hours.

After a week of fasting there came a natural desire for food, and thence
on he enjoyed without distress of stomach all he wished to take. Thence
on he lived with only the least discomfort, and with whispering lips he
dictated to me his will, conveying large property. He could look with
meaning when the power to whisper was gone, and life ended as the going
out of a candle.

For months his sufferings had nearly all been due to food masses in a
state of decomposition. He saw clearly and mentioned often that his had
been a case of starvation from overfeeding. Nature finally had to
succumb because she was not also able to deal with a clearly avoidable
disease, indigestion; but she kept up a brave fight until the body was
nearly absorbed.

As soon as the stomach and bowels became empty the friends noticed that
nervousness largely disappeared. His sleeps were much longer, because
not broken by coughing as before; and as the brain was not taxed with
food masses there was an accumulation of power that was clearly revealed
in the cheer of expression and a calmness as if heavenly rest had come
at last.

A few years ago an attorney in this city had to endure a course of fever
to which was added all the known barbarism of the times. Under enforced
food and stimulants his mind at last became so weak that the dosings
were forced down his throat. There were many weeks of life at lowest ebb
before the man of torture (the doctor) was compelled to discontinue his
evil work, and there were then months, extending to years, during which
there appeared a colorless ghost of his former self on the streets--and
this in spite of a wood-chop