THE MAN WITH THE LIVER.

Gisborne Times, 17 October 1908, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE MAN WITH THE LIVER.

(By F. A. Hornibfook, iu .tlie -.. . “ “Canterbury Times.’-’) *

. “You can’t have, your cake and eat it,” said Jones. “That’s all, you kuow about it,” said his livery friend, as-he swallowed another digestive tabloid. The curse of Cain.,is nothin" compared with the curse of/the sluggish liver that modern business men suffer from. The man with a liver is found everywhere ;. always discontented, always growling, always livery. He is met on the tram, in tile train ; the train is late, the livery man consults liis watch, grumbles '; at the authorities that print timetables that they do' hot follow, and lie proceeds to make himself, if possible, more miserable than ever. The weather is a'favorite theme for our livery friend. When the weather>is bracing and all Nature is sparkling and animated the livery man says, with a snarl: “Oh, yes, lovely‘weather we’re, having, but. we shall surely suffer tor tins.” When the temperature is high he growls about tlie lica.t, and wishes for the bracing days Of winter, - and when it’s cold lie ' growls abouti-tho short days and the Coidnights* making one realise the truth of the**- old rhyme: _ As. a rule, mall’s a- fool;

AA r lien it’s hot lie wants it cool, AVlien it’s cool lie wants it hot ; Always wants it what it’s not. Election time also affords the livery man a chance to moralise. He tells you, with fierce joy, that the country is gorjjg to the dogs, and that we cannot go on much longer in such extravagant expenditure, - that we shall soon be engulfed in fina’ncial ruin, land lie tells you, exultingly, that this time is near at hand. The livery man soliloquises on the rising generation. He fells you that when he was a boy they did things differently.; . The livery riran' blames everything and everybody except his own -wretched method of living. He will persist in treating hik stomaeli. as if it- were a- _human garbage hariel, and at- last, when that long-suffering organ turns in desperation—in fact, goes out on strike—the livery man will not even submit to arbitration, but tries to get it to work with' powerful cathartics and violent purgatives. Tlie livery man is often an enijiaoyer, and liis clerks can generally gunge his ljyer as they would'a thermometer. Frequently..tlio livery-man is'married, aiid then' his humor, instead of creating heme, sweet home, creates at hideous environment; the trials of Job are montnnents of placid ease compared with the trials of the-livery man’s wife. If her lord aiid master has a miner position in his business which .makes him of necessity civil and subservient to employers, who have no sympathy with livers, the livery mail bottles his bile all day till lie reaches home, and to quote the rhyme':— AVhen he’s at* work, lie’s just plain ✓. Bill, - And AVTiI-yum to the heads. All day sits there a deadly still invoicing .‘feather beds: But see him when he’s home from work, My! don’t he fret and rouso, . There’s no mistaking then who is The master of the ’ouse.

I once heard a man who ’suffered from chronic liver described by a' medical friend of ."mine as likely to be a very decent fellow if be liad bis gall-bladder removed. Tn ninety-nine pases*out of a hundred if tlie liver is wrong there is. only one person to blame, and that person :is the Individual himself. Examine your food closely,’ and ask yourself the questions: • Do 1 bolt any foqd? Do 1 wash it down with gulps of liquid? Do I rise from the table having to divorce tlio buttons from the button-holes of my waistcoat? Do r I pour alcohol, down friy throat at all times, and in drinking other jaeoplc’s health ruin my own? Do I talk of an eight hours’ working day for myself, and a twentyfour hours’ working day for my stomach ? Do & realise" that I have -a/ body that needs ;to ho attended to) or have I. sacrificed, in tlie mad rush for business and money-making, all the simple joys, that help t° make "life worth living?/iio ’Lfjit to my.food with a mind full .of business worries, iu such a mental attitude that no-food could do good ? Finally have I got that insane idea-that so many business men get, that I cannot :be done without ?■ Am I trying to dot the work ol two. men ?:• Stop now, To Jpokj after yourself, or you may take time; to-attend your own funeral—a l’unct- ; ion ten or twenty years in advance of Nature’s call, and r this by aieglectmg tlio simple laws of health.