HOW DID THE THIEF GET IN?

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1263, 14 May 1896, Page 27

HOW DID THE THIEF GET IN?

Vou wake up some morning aud miss your watch, your purse, your best clothes and other valuables. Yet neither you nor any member of your family beard a sound during the night. Neither is there a sign of bow the thief got into tho bouse, nor by what road he decamped. Vou rush round and tell the police, and also decide Co' '*eep a dog and a shot gun. You wilt let thiel'cc know they mustn't come fooling around your promises after this. A sensible procedure. Meaft-vhilo your watch, your money, ic, are gone. Quito so. Now, suppose I should toll you that the thief who stole your property novo* entered your house at all; that he whs born in it ; had lived twenty years in it ; never had been out of it till he went oil' with your things, albeit not a soul of you had ever seen or beard of him. What would you say to me ? You would call mo ri.ii idiot and threaten to havo mo sent back to the asylum. But don't bo too sure.

" Later on," says Mr Heakin, "rheumatism struck into my system, and I had pains all over me. I was confined to my bed for thteo months with it and could not dress myself. In this general condition I continued for five' years. One after another 1 was treated by fourteen doctors in that time, but their medicines did me little or no good. At one time I went to the Infirmary at Shrewsbury, whoro they treated mo for heart disease; but I got worse, and, feeling anxious, returned homo."

Hot ho was finally cured wo will mention in a minuto. First, however, about his rheumatism. Every intelligent person knows that rheumatism and gout (its twin brother) is virtually a universal ailment. It doos its cruel and body-racking work in every country and climate. No other malady causes so vast an aggregate of suffering and disability. Whatever will euro it is worth more moiioj' hi England than a gold mine in every country. But does rheumatism "strike into" tho system as a bullet or a knife might strike into if? No, rheumatism is a thief who steals away our comfort and strength ; but it is a thief, as 1 said, who G bom on the premises. In other words, it G ono—and only one—of tho direct consequences of indigestion and dyspepsia. And this is tho why and wherefore: indigestion creates a.poison called uric acid ; this acid combines with tho chloride of sodium to form a salt; this salt is urate of sodium, which is deposited in the form of sharp crystals in tho muscles aud joints. Then comes inflammation and agony, ofherwiso rheumatism. Thus you preceivo that it doesn't como from the outside, but from tho inside—from tho stomach. Our friend's cold, caught in tho mine, didn't produce his rheumatism, it clogged his skin, and so kept all the poison in his body instead of letting part of it out. Here is our very good friend Mr Richard Heakin, of Pentorvin, Salop, who expresses an opinion in this lino. Let us have his exact words. Ho says struck into my system." Of course we understand that he speaks after tho >~ ..mor of men. You know wo talk or being "attacked" by this, that, and tho other complaint as though diseases were like soldiers or wild beasts. " Doesn't make any odds," do you say ? Beg pardon, but it dot's—heavy odds. For it teaches us to look in the wmnj direction for danyer. Do you see now Y

Thirteen years ago, in the spring of 1880, whilst working- in the Roman Gravel Leal Mines, Mr Heakin took a bad cold. Ho got over the cold, but not over what followed it. lie was feeble, without appetite, and had a deal of pain in the chest and sides. His eyes and skin wero tinted yellow, and his hands and feet wore cold and clammy. Frequently he would break out into a cold perspiration, as a man does on receiving a nervous shock caused by something fearful or horrible. Hit was also troubled with pain at the heart and had spells ol difficult breathing—what medical men call asthma.

Mr Heakin adds : " 1 was cured at last by Mother Seigel's Curative Syrup, and without it I believe I should have been dead long ago."

Very likely, very likely; for this thief, although he may wait long for his opportunity, isn't always satisfied to run away with our comfort and our money ; ho often takes life too.