UNKNOWN

Wairarapa Standard, Volume XX, Issue 2058, 22 April 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

UNKNOWN

Tko Causes that Lead to it— The mo:--,v all -i —those who are enervated by a life of frivoiiiv and luxurious living. A certain phase of existence is altogether too rushing end Pm artificial. The lady of to-day tells you she is living mi excitement, just, living mi hj r nerves. This kind of existence taken in excess soon injures the constitution. Such a woman has no appreciation of the pure, ample, and exquisite enjoyments of nature. She has heard of the soothing and intoxicating qualities of morphine from some dear familiar friend, and like a true daughter of Kve must taste the apple. The pleasant intoxication and frotdo n from caio which follow the use of the pernicious drug form too powerful a temptation to its use for all women to resist successfully. It is very much of the nature of alcohol, as it leaves behind it a sense of depressing debility, which nothing but a fresh resort to the drug relieves. When constantly used it creates an nrtilicial necessity for it use. The abuser of opium begins in small doses, which act as a stimulant and excitant, producing pleasing and dreamy sensations, hut in a short time the system becoming habituated to the use of the drug, it fails to produce its pleasant effect. Then Ibe person resorts to increased doses, and «o it continues until the system, saturated with opium, only responds to the largest doses, which, it they bad been used at the beginning, would have produced death in a fe-wtiiours. In small doses opium in any form is a stimulant to one not accustomed to its use—to the same person in larger doses it is a powerful and deadly narcotic. Comparativelv few persons who indulge in opium to excess arc treated in insane hospitals, as many of them are placed in private institutions established fur such purposes, but some of the worst cases find their way into insane hospitals, when physicians can be found to certify that the patient is insane. The now law for the commitment of inebriates to insane hospitals unfortunately docs not cover tie se cases. Very often (he abuse of alcohol and narcotics, especially morphine and chloral, can be traced in the same individual. These arc generally very intractable, and require a long period of treatment, with complete abstention from the use of narcotics for some time. J'or this reason the restraints of an insane hospital or some special institution fur inebriates ami opium slaves are ncccssarv.

The Food Question. Our next door neighbor, alter having rigidly dieted for a year, scolfs at the old maxim which bids us always rise from the table bun-try, as if the natural instinct of the body were given solely to be disregarded, and to be a constant uneasiness. Tins ascetic; rule is at one extreme of tha food question, opposing which we may place the houn ly old saying, that the way to eat mush and milk was to “sit two inches from the labie, and eat till you touch." Science and common sense alike forbid hunger and repletion. The body must be tided as well fed. physicians tell us, and they slate that the underfed absorb a large part of medical practice for the relief of disease from lack of nutrition, among which are “nervous prostration, amentia, backache, and tiau-ea or sick headache.” The symptoms of chronic starvation arc found not only among underpaid operatives and shop girls. but in good families, among growing school children, hoys lilting for college, s -ei dv girls, young mothers of families, and winking women. (Quality of food, with all the In al and force it may contain, will not make up for quantity, and the belter educate! classes readily deceive themselves, and mislead others, as to the amount of food n-eessary for welfare, ruder the conceit that earing lr artily is neither wholesome nor relined, a habit of going without enough sustenance is established, till the stomach grows eontra’ied from want of suflleient victualing, and the result is low tone, and weakness of body and brain. Much of the ill humor, the dullness and flatness of intercourse, the failure in business and liteiature, is directly traceable to defective nutrition. 'The mind is slow, or confused, the nerves give way under strain, and that snappishness results which is really a form of hystetia. in men and women.

Long Life- There is little doubt tb.it longevity is apt to run in families, and yet it is well worth mentioning that many people who attain a great age have come of phthisical families—in some cases b.-th parents have been known to have died of phthisis. It is probable that if a searching personal inquiry could be made, it would bo found (hat such people, wisely wanted by, the delicacy and early deaths of their relatives, had adopted wit o'esome and serene conditions of life, holding themselves aloof from dissipation, and as lavas possible from the wearing and tearing coarse of things. Many people, snatching fit a ‘'short life and a merry one,” get a short life and a sad one, when they might have had a long and satisfying career. The best way to garner no harvest is to begin to reap when tlie del.is arc given. The famous physician, Hefberden, survived his ninetieth year in health and honor, Instead of starting in life as do many young men. saying, •■How many things there are which I want and must immediately have—house, carriage, and everything to match ! ” and iucurringsolemn responsibilities without thought ot how they are to be fuliiiled, Kerberden persevered in a quiet country practice till he was thirtyeight, .and when lie went to London and achieved great success, lie still declined court preferment with all its carping worry and gilded dissatisfaction. It is a fact that it our lues were really better worth Jiving than tinware, many of them would b.; much lunger. Those who end their days by knife or cord ate not the only suicides, Sensuality, ambition, avarice, atrd emulation have slain their millions.

An Old-Fashioned Recipe.— Vcu want (■) develops' your muscles, my lad,' Let me tell y.m how to do it. Take an ordinary sawhorse and plant it firmly in the middle of the slu'd. Tlum take down from its rusty peg an old-fashioned and sharp saw. do to the Woodpile, Select a knotty log, one (hat lias excrescences all over it, as though it had suffered from a chronic inllammatory rheumatism. and then lay it tenderly in the jaws of th" saw-horse. I’ut the teeth of the saw anywhere, it makes no difference where, and draw it towards yon and push it from you in persistent al<eniation until the 100 squeaks and at last drops asunder. That is the host exercise in the world. If our youth would engage in it with more alacrity and enthusiasm they would be litter to hold public olliee honestly hy-and-bye. You may stigmatize or even execrate it as mere wood sawing, hut it is pood exercise, nevertheless, and will (ell with great elfect on the bleeps and, for that matter, everywhere else. It is a little old-fashioned, perhaps, hut time lias nut destroyed its value.

Gray Hair —That gray hair is wot caused by old age is proved by the fact that many persons begin to show gray hairs while they nr.' yet, in their twenties, and some while in tii- ir teens. Tin’s does not by any means argil" a premature decay of the constitution. 11 is a purely local phenomenon; and may coex;-!, with unusual bodily vigor. The celebrated author and traveller, (ieorge lionow, turned qinte gray before tie was thirty, but was an extra n-dinary swimmer and atlilet." a! oxiv-live. fiie spot where gravness api. .rs d.'Tris with the in.tmdn.il. The philo--'pcnha'i-i. began to turn gray on t U"':ph s. and C'.mphvvnily itaue.l a th e v 'hat 'h’si.au indication of rigorous ul '1 aetivliy. I!ae,.|..i-amaik-din(b ; ,.n:ee. i e. i r.'ii oil' r, I >r. (trbigno -i\ ■, I In,; i n i lie many v :e - ie- q."lil in S null America hj" SC. a 'la. n..0 e I nlie, 'f 1 1 e v i uvu ie,.. re slo A 1 y I ii. Hi tile a hue... s;*o