HOW TO SLEEP

Evening Star, Issue 19000, 23 July 1925, Page 4

HOW TO SLEEP

RECOMMENDED E ECIPES. Repetition by heart of Keats’s ‘ Ode to Sleep,’ plugging the oars with cotton wool, changing to new bedroom, and a “ nightcap ” of whisky and soda were some cures for insomnia suggested by Dr C. P. Symonds, E.R.G.P., in an address to tho Oxford Medical Society (says tho ‘Daily Chronicle’). “ Most of jis,” says Dr Symonds, “have acquired a ritual of some kind, perhaps unconsciously, which stands us in good stead when sleeplessness is threatened. It includes tho whole business of undressing and getting into bed. Tho habit of rending in bed is often part of it. When sleeplessness has persisted for any length of time the old rituals lose their value, and may even facilitate insomnia. Then is tho time to initiate new rites, beginning by moving the patient, if not into another house, at any rate into a new bedroom. As a finishing touch, I recommend tbo repetition by heart of some soporific verse. Keats’s ‘ Ode to Sleep,’ in my experience, is unsurpassable. Sleeplessness of emotional origin should be taken in hand early, for the habit of insomnia is readily acquired, and we are then apt to encounter as a perpetual cause of sleeplessness the anxiety about sleep.” Dr Symonds said that during tho war he learned to sleep soundly in a shallow dugout, behind which an 18pounder field gun fired at frequent, but irregular, intervals. On the other hand, the shriek of an approaching shell at dangerous proximity would bring him in an instant to the full possession of his faculties.