NOT HEAVY TO HIM..

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 211, 6 September 1899, Page 6

NOT HEAVY TO HIM..

The man on the elephant's back is rtothing to the elephant, The big beast doesn't mind him any more than one of those immense dray horses you see in London minds the brass ornaments on his harness. Yet on my back or yours the man would be a- load; and, if fastened to a lark's wings, the little brasses would hold him to the earth. Thus, we are reminded, my thoughful friends, that there are no absolute facts. The burden depends on the back. Albeit Samson walked off with the gates of Gaza, an ordinary garden gate woujd, 1 am sure, prove all that we should want to lug. It follows that weight or heaviness can, as the advertisements say, "be supplied in a variety of styles." When, for example, Mr Sidney Challanger mentions in a letter that at a certain period he was "heavy," he does not mean that he tipped the scales at a stone or two more than usual. His horse would have felt that, in case he rode one; but the truth is that at the time referred to he was actually under his proper weight by several pounds. What he wants us to understand is that he was heavy to himself; it was not an increase of weight but an increase of weakness, having practically the same result. His explanation is that in the early part of 1890 he began to feel ill and out of sorts. He went about in a mazy way, feeling badly without knowing what the trouble was or how to account for it. "I had," Mr Challanger goes on to tell us, "a nasty taste in the mouth and no relish for my meals." But eat we all must, ox- starve; and eat he did. Not much, though. At best it was a forced business. Nothing tasted natural or good, and he took just enough to keep him going until tne inext meal time should come round. "And even for that I had to suffer, he says. "After getting it down I had, almost immediately, a sense of fulness or distension of the stomach and pain at the chest as if a bit of food had lodged there—which couldn t be." No, nothing lodged anywhere. What there was of it went straight down into Mr Challanger's stomach where it at once began to ferment and produce a gas which caused the feeling of fulness, while the irritated nerves set up the pain. It was not too much food, but food not digested food turned sour in the stomach— with the whole body behind it failing of the needed stimulus and nourishment of food, and wondering what the matter was. It was this state of matters that made him, to use his own words, "heavy, drowsy, and languid." Any river in England, after a long drought in summer, looks just as Mr Challanger felt—heavy, drowsy, and languid. And for an identical reason—the lack of necessary supplies. Wait an instant, though! Don't miss the point. The rain, when it comes, fills the river by a thousand little channels falling directly into it. Not so as to food and body. Between them is a process; a mechanical, chemical and vital operation — digestion.1 Mark you that, and act accordingly. Whether in the sky or on the ground water is water —the same thing. But food and body are not the same thing. The first must be transmuted into the second by the miracle called digestion; for of all God's ways in nature none is more awful, more amazing, more glorious. And, when impeded or overborne, none which punishes, the interference more certainly and swift. "I got little or no sleep," continues our friend, 'and awoke in the morning tired out, as after a hard day's work. Presently I could hardly walk, for very weakness, and from time to time had to give up work altogether. No medicine helped me —and I tried plenty. "After three wretched years of this, Mrs Bird, of Tallistom, told my wife about Mother Seigel's Syrup, and through her advised me to try it. She said my ailment was indigestion and the Syrup would cure it. And it did. One bottle . greatly relieved me. I could eat freely, and food agreed with me. I persevered with the remedy and got strong as ever. All the pain and heaviness left me, and I felt light and energetic,. although I have gained in weight."— (Signed) Sydney Challanger, Gladstone Villa, Cwm, near Waunllwyd, Mon., August 30th, 1898.