IT IS EASY TO ASK QUESTIONS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1196, 1 February 1895, Page 19

IT IS EASY TO ASK QUESTIONS.

A child can ask questions that a wise man can’t answer. Yes; and there are some questions that the ablest don’t like to have people ask them. Say a question of this sort—while we are about it, however, we might as well tell the story straight away and have done with it.

Mrs Sarah Mace was very ill with influenza. That was in February, 1892, the time of the epidemic. The attack was severe. She was suddenly seized with a violent pain in the head (both front and back) and temples. She had pain in all her joints, too, and was hot and feverish. She went to bed and sent for the doctor. He came, examined her, took her temperature over 100 degrees—and said very little, like a wise man. The lady could not turn herself in bed. She lived on slops, such as milk and broth; she could not swallow a morsel of solid food. Her husband pressed her to take strong food, saying, “If you don’t eat you wall starve.” Right enough ; but he forgot that when one can’t eat he can’t eat, and there’s an end.

Well, she got weaker and weaker, and fell away until there wasn’t much left of her but skin and bone. Then, in her anxiety, she put her question: “Doctor, do you think I shall get well ?” The doctor’s answer waß true and honest; we like and respect him for it.' He said, “ Mrs Mace, Ido not know.” He couldn’t tell. Neither could any other doctor; no, not even if he had a string of titles to his name as long a kite’s tail. But did she get well ? Wait a bit. We must hark back a minute now.

Along about the 10th of March, 1880 Mrs Mace began to feel tired, languid, and weary, as if her work were too much for her, she said. She had a bad taste in the mouth, poor appetite, and whatever she ate gave her pain at the chest and heart. “ I had,” she continues, “ a dull heavy pain at the right side and between the shoulders, and a sinking feeling at the pit of the stomach, and a rising of foul gas in my throat. Later on I had rheumatic pains in my heart, chest and back. I sent for a doctor, who attended me for six weeks, but I got worse. One day the cook said, ‘ Why don’t you try Mother Seigel’s Curative Syrup ?’—this being a' medicine my mistress (I was living with a lady in Camden Town) kept in the house for family use. I did so, and was soon as strong as ever.” Years fled away, and in 1891 she had the first attack of influenza,, and in 1892 the second, already described in part. We now complete the account of the 1892 attack. Mrs Mace says : “ The doctor continued to attend me for five weeks, and I took his medicines for that time, but gained no strength. After having suffered for seven weeks I said to my husband, * I will now see what Mother Seigel’s Curative Syrup will do for me. Perhaps it may euro influenza as well as other ailments.’ I carried out this resolution; began taking the Syrup, and was soon on my feet again, and have since kept in excellent health. (Signed) Sabah ILce, Monk’s Farm, Great Warley, Brentwood, Essex, August 27th, 1892.” Now we have never advertised Mother Seigel’s Crri*ati'ver Syrup ’ hs- a remedy for influenza. Yet the facts stated by Mrs Mace cannot be disputed. What is the conclusion ? A very simple one indeed. She did not have influenza until her system had been debilitated by indigestion and dyspepsia. It krsuch people generally (almost wholly) that all epidemic diseases attack. The dreaded cholera scarcely ever - touches anybody except a dyspeptic—choleraJb a malady of the bowels only. The more we hear of disease the more the proof piles up showing that persons with a sound digestion are safe against dying of anything except violence or old age. The Syrup cured Mrs Mace’s influenza by taking away the ground it stood on—the torpidity of her digestion. She once asked, “ Doctor, do you think I shall get well ? ” Time and Mother Seigel have said “Yes.”