HOW DID THE THIEF GET IN?

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1264, 21 May 1896, Page 16

HOW DID THE THIEF GET IN?

You wako up some morning and miss your watch, your purse, your best clothes and other valuables. Yet neither you nor

any member of your family heard a sound during the night. Neither is there a sign of how the thief got into the house, nor by what road lie decamped, You rush round and tell the police, and also decide to keep a dog and a shot gun. Y r ou will let thieves know they mustn’t come fooling around your premises after this. x\ sensible procedure. Meanwhile your watch, your money, Ac., are gone. Quito so,

Now, suppose I should tell you that tho thief who stolo your property never entered your house at all ; that ho was born in it ; had lived twenty years in it ; never had been out of it till ho Went off wit h your tilings, albeit not a soul of you had ever seen or heard of him. What would you say to me ? You would call mo ail idiot and threaten to have mo sent hack lo the asylum. But don’t bo too suro.

“ Later on,” says Mr Ileakin, " rheumatism struck into my system, and I had pains all over me. 1 was confined to my bod for tlireo 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 mo little or no good. At one time I. went t.o tho Jnfirmary at Shrewsbury, where they treated mo for heart disease; but I got worse, and, feeling anxious, returned homo.”

Ho v ho was finally cured wo will mention in a minute. First, how over, about his rheumatism. Every intelligent person knows that rheumatism and gout (its twin brother) is virtually a universal ailment. It does its cruel and body-racking work in l every country and climate. No other malady causes so vast an aggregate of suffering and disability. Whatever will euro it is worth more money in England than a gold mine in every country. Hut does rheumatism “strike into” the system as a bullet or a knife might strike into it P No, rheumatism is a thief who steals away our comfort and strength ; but it is a thief, as J said, who is horn on the premises. In other words, it; is one—and only one—of the direct consequences of indigestion and dyspepsia. And this is the why and wherefore: Indigestion creates a poison called uric acid ; this acid combines with the chloride of sodium to form a salt; this salt is urato of sodium, which is deposited in the form of sharp crystals in the muscles and join Is. Then comes inflammation and agony, otherwise rheumatism. Thus you preceivo that it doesn’t come from the outside, but fromtho inside—from the stomach. Our friend's cold, caught in the mine, didn’t produce his rheumatism, it clogged iiis 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 Ileakin, of Pentervin, Salop, who expresses an opinion in this line. Let us have his exact words. He says struck into my system.” Of course wo understand that he speaks after the manner of men. You know wo talk of being “attacked” by this, that, and the other complaint as though diseases were like soldiers or wild beasts. “ Doesn’t make any odds,” do you say ? li“g pardon, but it does —heavy odds. For it tcaches us (a lack in the wru.i'j direction J'or danger. Do you see now ? Thirteen years ago, in the spring of 188 U, whilst working in tho Roman Gravel Leal Mines, Mr Ileakin took a bad cold. lie got over tho cold, but not over what followed it. He was feeble, without appetite, and had a deal of pain in tho chest and sides. His eyes and skin were tinted yellow, and his hands and feet were cold and clammy. Frequently ho would break out into a cold perspiration, as a man does on receiving a nervous shock caused by something fearful or horrible. lie was also troubled with pain at the heart and had spells of diliieult breathing—what medical men call asthma.

Mr Ileakin adds : “ I 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 lie may wait long for his opportunity, isn’t always satisfied to run away with our comfort and our money ; he often takes life too.