TEN MONTHS' SUFFERING IN A HOSPITAL.

Taranaki Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 8759, 22 April 1890, Page 4

TEN MONTHS' SUFFERING IN A HOSPITAL.

There is an old saying that physicians ire a class of men who poar drugs, of which they know little, into bodies of which they' know less. Thi3 is both true and untrue at the samo time. There are good and poor lawyers, and Rood and pool doctors. The trouble with these medical gentlemen as a profession is that they are clannish, and apt to be conceited. They don't like to be beaten at tb.6ir own trade by outsiders who have never studied medicine. They therefore pay, by tbeir frequent failures, the penalty of refusing instruction unless the toacher bears their own " Hall Mark." A.n eminent physician — Dr. BrownSequurd, of Paris — states the fact accurately when he says : '"The madical profession are so bound up ia their selfconfidence nnd conceit that they allow the diamond truths of science to be picked up by persons entirely outside their ranks." We gi^e a most interesting incident, which illustrates this important truth. The steamship "Concordia," of the Donaldson Line, sailed from Glasgow for Baltimore in 1887, having ou board as a fireman a man named Richard Wade, of Glasgow. He had been fireman for fourtefcn years on various ships sailing to America, China, and ludia. He bad borne hard and exhausting labor, and hud been healthy and strong. On the trip we now name he began for the first time to feel weak and ill. His appetite failed and be suffered from drowsiness, heartburn, a bad taste in the month, and C)Btiveness and irreguliarity of the bowels. Sometimes when at work he had attacks of giddiness, but supposed it to be caused by the heat of the fire-room. Quite often he was sick and felt like vomiting, and had some pain in the head. Later during the paeeagb he grew worse, and when the ship reached Halifax ha was placed in the Victoria General Hospital, and the ship sailed away without him. The house surgeon gave him some powders to stop the vomiting, and the next day the visit ing ph)Bician gave him a mixtuie to take every four hours. Within two days Wude was so much worse that the doctors stopped both the powders and the mixture. A month paeßed, and the poor fireman getting worse and worse* Then came another doctor, who was to be viaitiag physician for the next five months. He gave other medicines but not much relief. Nearly all that time Wade suffered great torture ; he digested nothini', throwing up all he ate. There was terrible pain ii\ the bowel?, burning heat in the throat, heartburn, and raking headache. The patient was now taking a mixture every four hours, powders one after eaoh meal co digest tho food, operating pills one every night, and temperature pills two each night to stop the cold sweats. If drugs could cure hi in at til), Richard hud an idea that he took enough to do it. But on the other band pleurisy set in and the doctors took ninety ounces of matter out of his right side, and then told him ne was sure to die. Five months more rolled by, and there was another change of visiting pbyßiciuns. The new one gave Wade a mixture which be said made him tremble like a leaf on a tree. At this crisis Wade's Scotch blood asserted itself. He refused to stand any more dosing, and told the doctors that if he must die he could die m well without them as with them- By this lio>e a cup of milk would turn sour on his stomach, and lie there for day&. Our friend from Glasgow was like a wreck on a shoal, fust going to pieces. We will toll tlie rest of his experience in the words in which he communicated it to the press. He says : " When I was in this state a lady whom I had never seen catte to the hospital and talked with me. She proved to bo an angel of meic}', fur without her I should not now be alive. She told me of a medioine called 'Mother Seigel's Curative Sjrup,' and brought me a bottle next day. I startod with it, without consulting the doctors, and in only a few day ß' time I was out of bed calling for ham and eggs for breakfast. From that time keeping on with Mother Seigel'B great remedy, 1 got well fust, and was soon able to leave tho hospital and come home to Glasgow. I now fool as if I wrs in another world, and have no Ulneßs of any kind." Tho above facts are calmly recorded and impartially stated, and the reader may draw his own conclusion. We deem it best to use no names, although Mr Wade gave them in. bis original disposition. Bid address is Ko, 244, Stoboross Btreel, Glasgow, wlioro lvttsjre iffiJl roach Mint ' Sorrow