DIED WHILE IN PRAYER.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XXXVII, Issue 11870, 26 August 1893, Page 3

DIED WHILE IN PRAYER.

"Another man was found in a kneeling posture Ms face buried inhis hands, as if he had died in prayer." I clip this pathetic sentence from an account of tho St. Etieune coal mine disaster which occurred in France, in December, 1891. The fire had been smouldering for years in a remolo part of the mine, but its further advance had been stopped by barriers. Yet they proved insufficient at last, and the terrible fire-damp exploded, scattering death throughout the mine. Such incidents are too well known in England to need further explanation or comment. Has it ever struck you that the interior of tho human body iB like the interior of a coal mino ? Well, it ia. All the opsrations go on in solitude and darkness. Gases are engendered in it that are just as dangerous as fire-damp. Generally they— yet hold on, let's have the little story first. It's about a woman. In fact, it's from her, too, and is sure to interest somebody ; may be you. She says that a long run of time, from childhood to fears after her marriage, she never knew what illness was; that is, so as to'remember it, or to have it make a mars on her, as we may say. But mighty few folks manage to escape the old slave driver altogether. Nor did she. "It was in the summer of 1890," she rfays, " when I began to feel bad. My appetite was poor, and what I did eat gave me great pain and distress. My food seemed to lie like lead j and after every meal, no matter how simple the food was. I had the mostexcruciating pain you can imagine. I had a nagging, thudding, pain at my chest, and through to my shonlders, that was very hard to bear. So bad was it that I thought something (perhaps a tumour) was growing within me. As soon as ever food entered my stomach I «sed to say, " It isbeginning," meaning the gnawing pain. "I took all binds of things for relief and applied mustard plasters to the chest, but nothing did me any good. After a time I dared not take a proper meal; I was afraid to eat, and got very thin and weak. It was as much as I could do to go about my house work. In October of this yoar (1891) Mrs James Mercer, of 176, High Street, Longton, recommended me to try Mother Seigel's Curative Syrup, and I got a bottle and commenced to take it. After a few doses I felt relief. My food agreed with me, and by the time I had taken one large bottle all the pain had left mo, and I now feel as well aB ever I did," — Yoms tialy (signed), Mrs Elizabeth Weight, 12, King Street, Hanley, Staffordshire, November 19th, 1891. You ask me what the sad fate of the millers has to with the case of Mrs Wright. I'll tell you in half a minute. This lady says she was taken ill in the summer of 1890. Now, do you suppose the illness and tho cause of the illness came up at the same time? By no means. Cause first, effect afterwards— that'B the order, always. And, see here ! A cause may be at work for weeks or years before you notice any results ; and until you do notice rosults, you don't now there's aught gonewrong. Isn't that so ? The miners, to be sure, knew thero was a fire in the mine. But it was fenced off from them and they thought they were safe. The barriers leaked, and death griped them in a twinkling of an eye. The body is like a mine, as I have said. Disease and death are caused by the action of poisonous gases and acids inside of it. They all start from the stomach and then creep into every part, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. In some acute diseases very fast. The doctors often call gout an " explosion " of uric acid. The sourco of all these deadly things is indigestion and dyspepsia. Slight symptoms first, then the more terrible and alarming. Watoh the way it o-nnes on. This was Mrs Wright's ailment. She suffered fifteen months before Blie found out what the matter was and what to do. Gracious, mercy ! if we only knew the sort of things that go on in our bodies we'd understand that it's about as dangerous to work in a kitchen as in a coal mine.