REMINDED OF HIS DEAD MOTHER.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXX, Issue 9157, 25 March 1893, Page 3

REMINDED OF HIS DEAD MOTHER.

[extract from a private letter.

It was the latter part of August, 1891. A friend and I had come down from Ramsgare to Minster, to see the venerable church, there, which is a thousand years old. I entered the churchyard and seated myself upon a nameless grave while he went in search of somebody to unlock the doors of the edifice and show its wonders. In a few minutes he returned in company with an elderly lady, to whom he introduced me, saying she was the custodian and guide of the place. I gazed at her face for some moments without a word. If my own mother, dead and gone 15 years, had come back to speak to her only son, I should scarcely have been more astonished. For this woman was almost my mother's double; the same size, the same face, and the same way of parting the hair and combing if, in smooth bands from the forehead. I told her so, and we were friends before either fairly knew the other's name. What a queer world it is. She then conducted us through the ancient fane, and spoke of the long vanished past, of the monks and nuns who once sang and prayed within its walls, of the quaint carvings on the hard oak seats in the chancel, of that precious relic, the Cranmer Bible, which reposes in a glass box against a pillar, and of many matters besides, drawn from the apparently exhaustless well of her detailed and accurate* information. Finally the talk veered round to the wholesomeness of the vicinity, the bracing nature of its sea breezes and so on. Then our guide, Mrs. Sarah Herd, said r—" I have lived here in Minster 50 years, and seen many ups and downs. One of my sons is now in America, where he is doing well. He wants me to leave England and make my home with him, but I doubt if 1 ever shall. lam somewhat like that old yew tree out in the yard, deeply rooted to this soil, and might be the worse for pulling up. Then lam getting on iu life, and ills grow apace with age. la the spring of 1878 I had a serious attack. At first I scarcely knew what to make of it. There was no disease that I recognised in particular. I felt tired in body and weary in mind. There was much pain at my chest and back, and a tightness at the sides, as though physical force were applied there to restrain me from moving. My appetite, which was usually good, fell away; and whatever I ate or drank gave me pain, and I lived almost entirely on bread and water. I was always in pain and couldn't sleep so as to feel refreshed by it. After a time I grew so weak as to be unable to go about my work. A bitter and sickening fluid arose into my mouth, and I perspired to such an extent that the sweat sometimes rolled off my face to the floor."

I (the writer) break in upon Mrs. Herd's story at this point merely to say that this tendency to sweat without the provocation of labour or of exercise is always a sign of a debilitated condition of the system. it means that the blood is impure and impoverished, the kidneys working badly, and that* the body lacks nourishment and is living feebly on what was previously stored in it. In other words, the stomach has refused its duty and the other organs are in sympathy with it. Now we will let the lady proceed, begging pardon for the interruption.

She went on to say :— For a time 1 tried to cure myself with various domestic remedies which sometimes answer. But they failed, and I consulted a physician. With all respect to the doctors, they occasionally failed too. This one did. You know there comes a time in all long illnesses when we get in some way used to pain and misery, and make no further efforts to get rid of it. In fact, we don't know how, and so don't try. For about three years I remained wretched and ailing, and dull unhappy years they were. My sufferings were beyond all I had ever known before, yet there seemed nothing to do but to bear them as patiently as I could. At this date, ISBI, certain friends of mine spoke to me of the great benefit thev had received from the use of Mother Seigel r s Syrup, for indigestion and dyspepsia. This threw light on my mind, although I cannot say it made me at once a believer in Seigel'a Syrup. At length, however, in July, 1881, I began to take it. In all I used six bottles, and found my health fully restored. Ten years have elapsed, and I have had no attack since. But if I do in future I shall know where to put my hand on the remedy." Our visit being virtually over, we called for a few moments at Mrs. Herd's home, 2, High-street, Minster, Kent, and then wended our way back to Ramsgate. C. M. R. New York, October, 1891.