SOMETHING IN IT.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 4255, 6 July 1895, Page 4

SOMETHING IN IT.

Mark Twain once wrote a paper pointing out the appalling danger of going to bed as exemplified in bills of mortality. For one person who died out of his bed several hnndred buccumbed in bed, and now (remarks the " Lamet") we have Mr Ashby»Sterry drawing attention to the same thing. In a recent uurabor of the" Graphic " he says: — I have a theory that most people catch cold at night after they are in bed, and it is to this fact I attribute a great deal of the violent colds, the bronchial catarrhs, and influenza, which have been so prevalent. The temperature goes down suddenly in the night and people catch cold when they are asleep without knowing it. The evil is to be counteracted, not by piling on a lot of heavy blankets, but by wearing thick, close-fitting garments of a pv jama-like nature and warm soefcs on the feet. If this system were adopted I am quite certain it would be found beneficial." There is common sense in j this. People unquestionably may catch cold in bed, especially if they are at all restless, and so kick the bed-clothes off. In that event, if only clad in a thin cotton nightshirt they are sure to catch cold, whereas if clad in pyjams, not necessarily thick, but made of some woollen material, the chance of a chill is much lessened. Our ancestors, even as late as the eighteenth century, went to bed, as Malory, centuries earlier phrased it, " as naked as a needle," but only the hardest of them survived. We, however, are cast in more tender moulds, and require protection by night as well aa day.