SCIATICA'S SWIFT PAIN

Star (Christchurch), Issue 9509, 5 April 1909, Page 4

SCIATICA'S SWIFT PAIN

RENDERED THIS MAN 1 HELPLESS CRIPPLE.

Had to be Carried About: Mo phta to Ease the Pains: Dr. Williams' Pink Pills Cured the Cause.

A touch of Sciatica makes the whole system quiver with pain. The sharp, shooting pains are like red-hot needles in the hips and legs. Doctors call sciatica "Neuralgia of the Sciatic Nerve." That's the complaint in a nutshell. The nerves- have become starved, the system run down— then Sciatica or Neuralgia. Dr Williams' Pink Pills cured Sciatica in the case of Mr George Ellis, farmer, of Longford, Tasmania, who was so crippled with the complaint for six years that he was unable to do any work. They N cure by curing the cause; by making rich new blood, which is the food for weak, run-down nerves, and, when the nerves are toned, sciatica goes. Poultices and liniments are useless. Mr Ellis made the following statement to a re- " Some yfta« ago I was laid up with Sciatica and had to give up my work. The pains I endured were something awful. I could only hobble about the house on walk-ing-stioks. I sent for the, doctor and he blistered me from the hips ' to the feet. It gave me relief from the pain, but did' not cure me. I soon got bad again, and felt pains like red-hot needles in my legs. I drove to see the doctor and it took four men to lift me out of the cart and help me into the doctor's. ' He injected morphia to kill the pain, and gave mo medicine, but it did not cure inc. I was suffering for about six years when I read in a pamphlet of 'the wonderful cures of Sciatica by Dr Williams* Pink Pills- and I sent to. the chemist for two boxes. After taking one box I got relief, and after eight boxes I was cured and have not been troubled since, and am quite 'satisfied with the wonderful cure by Dr Williams' Pink Pills. lam glad to give this iestimonial for the benefit of other sufferers." The price is 3s per box, six boxes lGs Gd, and jf you have trouble 'in getting them, send a postal note for the amount to the Dr Williams' Medicine -Co. . of Australasia, Ltd., Wellington. ..and they will be sent post, free by return mail. . * .

wero removed, but the number of our guards wae doubled, and in keeping of eight soldiers with loaded guns we marched, tome forty of us, to where the wood-cutters were at work upon some more heavily-timbered ground. There we were made- to tako up between us all, on our shoulders., great spars, which we must bear down on the shore —the Centipede they called it, tho hardest toil the system, knew, for it crushed the life out of 11 man, toro and strained his sinews, bowed him beyond his years with its awful weight. I was rejoiced to see Pentwich marching ahead of me as we went out that morning, and sought a chance of speech with him," but itJiever came. It was towards midday — a scorching day in late January— when we poor, parched, sweating toilers made our third journey ;- finding no respite between the nrarches for all our exhaustion. We (shouldered .'.the . great log and turned to .bear it away to the waterside/ ,1 was ahead of Pentwich on this trip-; but' directly in front of me .shuffled the, lad whoni they had flogged that first morning. He had l , lain in the infirmary many days after lie was turned loose^ from his four dozen; but ;the severity of his punishment had crushed him, utterly in spirit and in body, so that his young strength was sapped for ever, and he was like a man prematurely aged. His tormentors, none the less, put/ him to such work as tho Centipede. ' He went on tottering ahead, and at each step he took I heard him sigh with the weight of the great beam he shared. Suddenly he bent and fell.

The weight had been .so proportioned that when he slipped from under it, it was too heavy for the rest of us to bear : we reeled and. wavered all along the line; and, letting the log down with a great crash, sprang to left and right. The shock threw guards and all into confusion; and though they levelled their guns to hold us in our places, we were so scattered that they could not well covgt all.

And Pentwich saw it. I heard him cry in my ear "Come!" And ere I knew I was racing beside him to the shelter of the nearest bush* Two shots rang out, but they missed us in their haste, /and they dared not fire again lest all stampede; and for that same reason they dared not follow us then. We were ' away scurrying, pehting madly through! the bush — free, for the time, and safe, and we sped on until I thought my heart must-burst, or I must choke for want of -breath. We did not stay our pace until we had rushed into a thick bebb of scrub, a Bout a watercourse, aud tlien Tentwich stopped, and, crying- "Rick, Rick — at last," flung his arms about me, and in our exhaustion >we fell together to the ground. We .babbled wildly then in hope and joy and fear, but wasted small time, for all that we had not spoken freely for three weary ,months. "If we can lie hid this day," Pentwich s^aid, " and get off into the bush to-night, wo may yet find a way of breaking through." '•' The Neck!" I groaned, for I had learnt a little of that place. " What chance?" v

"We'll try," he said, "Jnit now for a present hiding-place." We pressed down on. to the dry watercourse on that, caring not for 'all the thorns that pierced our skin as we wriggled under the brush, until we were securely hidden in* the heart of the thick scrub. A little muddy liquid lay in a shallow pool, where the water ran in time of rain ; and we forecd our way down to it and lapped, it up like dogs for all -its foulness\ of rotten leaves and bark. Then we lay listening, guessing . what orders were given down in the prison ; how soon they would be on our track.,., A dull boom sounded ; it was flung back by the hills in echoes — the roar of the piece that the Commandant had secured not long before from Hobart Town, and set up ready to' warn the watchers who guarded the Peninsula at Various points that convicts were away. "Ah !" Pentwich murmured ; "they are out." •.';,'. After that there wa6 a great silence about vs — nothing save the noisy chatter of a parrot flock- in a tall gum that broke the scrub above our heads. We lay, whispering, planning, If only we might get awayi and through the Neck, we had hope; but they guarded it so well with red-coats, and the long line of dogs chained at intervals across it, lest, any poor devil of a convict approach, for if he managed to escape the men he could not pass the bloodhounds. I had seen one man brought in who had essayed the Neck. The

Commandant had taken care that all of us should see that poor torn piece of humanity, whose break for freedom had brought him only to the jaws of tho dogs. This was the gauntlet we had yet to run, if we escaped that day from those who were scouring the hush on all sides for us.

They tracked us closely. Trembling beneatli the scrub we heard their voices suddenly on the slope above us. They seemed suspicious that we might be hidden ifi that scrub, for they stood awhile, and then with horror we beard them come crashing down through the brush' towards us. But the thicket beneath which we had crept proved overthorny for them : and they gave it up. They stood talking quite close to us theu, doubtless thinking it impossible that any man should have crawled through that barrier, they climbed up the slope again, and struck away into the higher ground. Thereat felon as I was, I yet offered my thanks to God that we had escaped the hands of them that administered the law. We dared not leave our hiding-place till nightfall. We lay under the scrub by the little pool, a prey to millions of mosquitoes and smarting from the thorns that had pierced our flesh. So silently we Jay that once a black snake came gliding through the undergrowth, and vanished like a flash as I caught up a stick. But we heard no sound of our pursuers. We were sick with the hunger that gnawed painfully at our stomachs, and they were turned already by the muddy water we had swallowed. Still, hope was high within our hearts, for as yet w© were free. W/> left our shelter when night fell: and as there was ho moon, we suffered terribly by falling, over logs and plunging into thorn -patches, as we sought to force our way to the higher ground in /the- darkness. .At length we brokethrough into the open bush again, and away wo' sped, striking north-east by the "stars, for in that direction I had gathered lay the Neck, which we must pass. For all our weakness, so hot for escape were we, we travelled far that night, and were well towards Signal Hill, as they call it, ere we could go no further. ' Wo sought shelter -in a coppice of young red gum trees, which grew very thickly and hid us securely. Wo judged it. not wise to travel by day ; but hunger pressed upon us so that we had no resource, and after a few hours 3 sleep we made off in the early dawn toward the coast. We fared better than we had dared hope. The Fates were merciflii, for a heavy shower of rain fell, and weighted all the bush, and though tho clouds cleared presently and the. sun earn© out in a .grey heat; we yet 5 found water from the leaves, and cooled our tongues. In one place, to our delight, we struck upon a sort of wild raspberry, growing in great abundance, and bearing a small, sweet, red fruit. We gathered them in handfuls, and stayed our stomachs with them— though as. we marched on we were far weaker, and our feet in the rough prison boots we wore were sore and weary. We were compelled) to rest many hours, and journeyed little the next night. It was the evening of the fourth day ere we drew near the coast, and hoa>d the awful roar' of waters up into the Blowhole, as tliey call it. "During that time we had lived on such few berries as we found, and the raw flesh- of a bandicoot that plunged before us into a rotten log, and, we hammered it out with stones. We suffered much from thirst; but fortunately, the weath«?r was unsettled, and the showers that fell gave us at least a little to drink.

We came upon one gruesome discovery as we drew towards the .Neck. It lay deep in a bed of springing saplir gs. where wo had sought shelter. Pentwich, who was a few paces ahead of me, started baclc suddenly, amd cried out, "My God!" I came up and stood besideTQim. He pointed to it with a shaking finger — a grim, grinning thing, with the fleshiess skull fallen forward on the breast, still covered with rotting patches of the yellow jacket. About the bones of the right leg an iron ring still hung. "An omen!" Pentwich muttered. Horror-«fcricksii at tho tale there told, we drew away with all the speed we might. v

It was a lovely summer evening as we hid in tho bush" above tho narrow spit that wo hlust cross to get away to our old haunts again ;\ so calm and still that the blue rings curled up directly from the huts below, and the wash of the sea was so low that we 6carce heard it. In the cover we hung till darkness came, for we knew that if the soldiers at # the huts below caught sight of us, our flight would end, for they would loose the dogs on us forthwith, whose long, dull mouthing rose up from the Neck. As darkness came, a line of lamps was lit across the Neck, and the great dogs grew noisy and bayed the one to the. other till the night was filled with sounds that sent a deadlier terror to my< heart.

"At the end of our tether at last," I muttered to Pentwich, but he vouchsafed no reply, only sat gazing through the bush with fiery eyes -at the narrow track that led away in the direction of Port Arthur. Suddenly he motioned to me to crouch lower; and started to wriggle off through the ferns towards the track, dragging after him a stout waddy he had picked for a weapon. I followed him as stealthily, and soon I. guessed the cause, for coming slowly through the gloom I caught a glimpse of. a dull, shadowy figure. It was some redcoat off duty, enjoying a stroll in the evening air., and humming a snatch of a ditty as he came. „ Pentwich allowed him to pass us by; but rose up at his back, and while I was stricken with 'horror, swung high the club and smote him down. He lay senseless and bleeding in the path, and as I leaped up and stood by Pentwich's side he dragged him apart into the bush, and, kneeling over him, drew from" his hip the pistol that he bore and a short hanger that was sheathed by his 6ide. \ " Now for it," ho cried, and started suddenly to run down towards the spit. I followed with what speed I might ; and so fast for all our weariness we went that we were past the huts and in the line of light ere the loud baying of the hounds told the sentry something was amiss. He stood directly in our path, with levelled piece.

"Halt! Who goes there?" he cried. But Pentwich, answering never a word, blazed at him with the pistol, missing for all his closeness; "and ere the man might recover he dashed the smoking weapon in his face with so sure an aim that the fellow went down like a log. We raced madly then across the spit, but the wholo guard was roused -now/ and straining at their chains the bloodhounds gave mouth till the night fras pandemonium. We struck the line of dogs immediately, and with a fierce clamour a great brute leaped at us,' hut his chain was' all too short, - and 'we rushed past ere he might

leap again. The redcoats fired a volley after us, to no avail, and we heard them following in hot chase, and shouting after us-. They did then the thing wo dreaded most, loosed a couple of bloodhounds after us, that came baying close on our heels, though we ran as never before. On they came, leaping through tho darkness; and suddenly Pentwich turned and caught tho first dog as it sprang fair and full upon the hanger. Over it rolled, kicking and snapping with a hideous outcry in its death agony ; but its fall wrenched the blade from Pentwich's hands, and ere he could grasp it and drag it out the second was upon us. It sprang straight for. me, whereat I screamed and sought to grip Its throat, but it bore me down, and, catching my shoulder m its jaws, shook me like a rat. I clutched at its throat with all my feeble strength', and straightway it left my shoulder; its hot breath was on my face; its gleaming eyes shone into mine; in another instant it had torn my throat ; but suddenly it groaned and sank upon me, and its blood splashed across my cheek. Pentwich tore the hanger from its neck, and drew me from under the dying brute ; then, linking his arm in mine, dragged me off with him. The terror past, I ran as swift as be, and soon wo gained the rising ground, and knew that we wero through; and though wo heard the shouting of our pursuers at no great distance in the rear, the baying •of the bloodhounds chained upon The Neck had died out ere some turned back, we guessed, to set the rest upon our track.