CHAPTER V ARE FRUITS AND VEGETABLES LUXURIES? In the house of diet fruits and vegetables may be likened to windows and doors, fire-places and chimneys; we could dispense with them, we could board up our windows and make a fire on a big stone in the middle of the room, letting the smoke escape through a hole in the roof, but such a course would not mean comfort year in and year out. So we may exist without fruits and vegetables, but it is worth while to stop and consider what we gain by their use. We shall have to admit at the outset that if we have to spend money or labor for them, fruits and vegetables are not the cheapest source of fuel for the human machine. Some of them are cheaper fuel than butter, eggs, or meat, but not as cheap as cereals, sugar, molasses, syrups, and some of our cheapest fats. This is true of potatoes, parsnips, carrots, dried peas and beans, and such fruits as bananas, prunes, raisins, dates, figs, and possibly a few other dried fruits, but we cannot justify our investment in most fruits and vegetables solely on the plea that they are "filling" in the sense of being of high fuel value; on this ground lettuce, celery, cabbage, tomatoes, lemons, rhubarb, cranberries, and many others would find no place in our domestic economy. Remembering that man does not live by fuel alone, we may find ample reasons for spending some of our food money upon things which at first thought seem to give an inadequate return. There is an old adage, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away," which if true means that the apple is a real economy, a kind of health insurance, for an apple costs seldom over five cents--often only one--and a doctor's visit may easily cost a hundred times as much. There is a certain amount of truth in the saying, though the apple does not have a monopoly of the supposed virtue. It is more accurate, if less poetic, to say that an _assortment_ of fruits and vegetables helps to keep us in good health. Before the days of modern "cold pack" canning, mothers used to assemble their little home groups in the spring and, in spite of sundry hidings under tables on the part of reluctant Johnnies and Susies, dutifully portion out herb tea or sulphur in molasses. Spring cleaning could never stop short of "cleansing the blood!" And after a monotonous winter of salt pork and fried potatoes no doubt heroic measures were necessary to make up for an ill-chosen diet. Nowadays we recognize no such seasonal need. We carry our surplus of fruits and vegetables over from summer to winter and profit not only in the greater daily pleasure of our tables but in clearer skins, brighter eyes, and less "spring fever."