4i 8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



There is no simple fact more forcefully borne in upon the writer 

 than that early rising and movement in the open air before breakfast is 

 a measure of vast importance in a large array of chronic ailments, 

 especially those involving gout, dyspepsia, constipation, obesity and 

 disorders of the sense organs. Many people aver that they are made 

 miserable by rising early, stirring about before taking food, and conse- 

 quently suffer from headaches, nausea, prostration and the like. These 

 phenomena are the results of some derangements in the circulatory 

 balance, most probably due to a morbid quality of sleep, which for the 

 most part is remediable. In proof of this statement is the fact, usually 

 clearly demonstrable, that if the physician can secure fair cooperation, 

 with persistence all this wretchedness will disappear. Particularly 

 is this shown if circumstances compel the patient to alter his habits 

 for the better. Abundant illustrative instances could be cited. Weir 

 Mitchell in his recommendations for the rest treatment, so valuable in 

 the repair of profound conditions of exhaustion, compels a fixed hour 

 for wakening, usually seven a.m. Often it has been the writer's duty 

 to soothe and explain to Dr. Mitchell's patients, who resented being 

 awakened, the reason for this regulation. 



Disuse of muscle is followed by atrophy; so of other tissues. 

 Strength can only grow by judicious, continued use. Witness the piti- 

 able spectacle of steady degeneration in the tissues, in mental and 

 physical aptitudes, commonly displayed in those of advancing years, 

 who, through withdrawal of normal stimuli to exertion, permit their 

 organs and their structures to fall into disuse. Prosperity, interpreted 

 so often to mean cessation of energies, is often fatal to physical and 

 mental efficiency. The antidote is simple and most effective, the reten- 

 tion of habits of usefulness applied all along the whole line of normal 

 activities. 



The whole range of bodily derangements and diseases can be inter- 

 preted through variations in the blood supply. This again depends 

 upon the incidence of diverse irritants, infections from without or 

 poisons generated within ; or such as are the products of changes in the 

 blood plasma effecting oxygenation. 



Sleep being the relaxation, suspension, of the consciousness, the 

 brain being the center of consciousness, it naturally follows that, as 

 evidence shows, the circulation in the brain is, during sleep, at the 

 lowest normal tension. Whatever disturbs sleep, therefore, probably 

 induces an afflux of blood to the brain. It is evident that to sleep 

 peacefully and continually it is important that the blood pressure shall 

 be as nearly as possible normal. If this be markedly above or below 

 par sleep is interfered with. Plethoric folk, however, supposedly of 

 over-tense vessels, often sleep better than the feeble and weakly; yet 

 they are more likely to slumber heavily, are difficult to wake, and on 



