374 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Apr. 1 



at all— and they do not see that it does any 

 harm. If you think nobody is sick, look at 

 the medicines on the shelves of our drug- 

 stores, and then read the advertisements 

 "given away free," etc. These medicine 

 men, at least some of them, get to be mil- 

 lionaires too ; and it must be there are sick 

 people or they v^^ould not find so many cus- 

 tomers.* We are a nation of people depend- 

 ing on poisonous drugs instead of looking for 

 health in the way God gave life to Adam 

 through his nostrils. 



Now, I have made a discovery lately in 

 the line of health. Terry and some of the 

 rest of the pure-air exponents may say it is 

 not a discovery because it is not new. But 

 it was new to me, and I suspect it is new to 

 at least some of the doctors. My discovery 

 is this : 



Indigestion, at least a part of it, is the re- 

 sult of breathing bad air, or, if you choose, 

 breathing the air over again after nature 

 has loaded it with poisonous exhalations and 

 sent it out of your nostrils. Mrs. Root and 

 I both of late have found it very hard to be 

 obliged to sit in a crowded audience— at 

 least where all the doors and windows are 

 closed. She has a headache, and it makes 

 me dull and stupid. As a consequence we 

 do not go out very much evenings except to 

 attend the evening preaching service ; and 

 as this does not last more than 20 or 30 

 minutes we get along even if the air is not 

 first- class. Well, our people here in Medina 

 have a lecture course every winter. They 

 pay some of the great orators $100 a night ; 

 and in order to give us our money's worth 

 the high-priced lecturer generally speaks 

 two hours. I object and protest ; but as 

 other people do not mind it I try to put 

 up with it. Once during the past winter a 

 celebrated speaker came during our severe 

 zero weather. There were several hundred 

 people in the hall — in fact, it was pretty 

 well crowded, but there was not a window 

 nor a door open anywhere— at least, none 

 that I know of. The people were crowded 

 so close around the windows that everybody 

 agreed a window could not be opened. I 

 think they might have been'let down a little 

 at the top; but somebody might have made a 

 fuss, even then. They would catch cold 

 from the draft on top of their heads, so I 

 put up with it and suffered torture for a 

 pretty good hour. It seemed to me that 

 evening that every person had a different 

 smell ; and I remember thinking it was a 

 sad reflection on my fellow-men as well as 

 on myself that we should be such an ' ' ill- 

 smelling" lot; and as this was a highly 

 intellectual discourse we had the very cream 

 of our people. The different smells got all 

 mixed up, and one had to breathe this foul 

 filth-laden air or stop breathing. I actually 

 considered getting up and going out. I 

 might have pretended I was sick, and it 



* The proprietors of the various medicines now adver- 

 tised "free of charge," or "not a cent to pay until you 

 are satisfied you have been benefitted," get money even- 

 tually by persuading people that drugs may take the 

 place of God's remedies— open air, pure water, etc. 



would not have been very much pretense 

 either. I reasoned, however, that, as my 

 appetite and digestion were excellent, and as 

 I was in unusually good health, I might and 

 thought I would stand it, and I did do so.* 



Now, I hope you will excuse me if I men- 

 tion some things that are not often discuss- 

 ed in print. I supposed that, after getting 

 out in the open air, and breathing heavily of 

 it, the foul matter would be expelled from 

 my lungs, and that there would be no after- 

 effects. The next day I was having my old 

 trouble with indigestion. My bowels were 

 all out of order, and I began to ask Mrs. 

 Root what I had been eating that upset me. 

 She said we had not had a thing on the table 

 that usually disagreed with either of us. 

 We are about alike in regard to our food. 

 Along in the afternoon, almost 24 hours 

 after breathing the bad air in the lecture- 

 room, foul gases began to come up from my 

 stomach and bowels. I stopped, and began 

 to think. The taste and smell seemed a 

 little famihar. Then I said, "Oh, yes ! now 

 I have it." The foul smell that came up 

 through my mouth from my digestive appa- 

 ratus was exactly the same as the evening 

 before. The poisonous gases that were gen- 

 erated from so many people breathing that 

 foul air many times over and over had found 

 a lodging-place somewhere in my system, 

 and nature had been irying for 24 hours to 

 get rid of them in different ways. The dis- 

 covery that I made, and which I feel pretty 

 sure many physicians do not understand nor 

 appreciate, is that the respiratory organs 

 are so connected with the organs of diges- 

 tion that the foul matter gets into the stom- 

 ach and makes one sick. Now, the above 

 is not a very rice thing to talk about. It is 

 a disagreeable subject in more ways than 

 one ; and did I not feel that not only our 

 health and strength but that human life 

 depends on people having a clear knowledge 

 of these things, I would not mention it as I 

 have done. Some of you may say I was 

 mistaken— it was only a notion of mine that 

 my bowels had gotten out of order because 

 I breathed bad air for an hour before going 

 to bed. But just wait a bit. I accidentally 

 experimented a little later, and gained some 

 evidence of the truthfulness of my theory. 

 Our automobile-house is a rather close build- 

 ing. By the aid of the steam-pipes under it 



* I believe our modern school buildings are pretty 

 well ventilated; and I have reason to think our opera 

 houses are intelligently planned in this respect, al- 

 though I know but little of the latter from personal 

 experience. But I am sure that our churches, unless it 

 is those of a very recent date, are sadly wanting in this 

 respect. Any room or hall that is liable to be packed 

 full of human beings should have the very best arrange- 

 ments for ventilation that modern science and experi- 

 ence dictate. I rejoice to know that such places are 

 now so well planned for the exit of the audience in case 

 of fire. The sad lessons we have had taught us the 

 importance of this. Now, a lack of air may result 

 in wholesale sickness and death by means of spreading 

 and encouraging consumption, pneumonia, etc. It does 

 not come all at once, like the Iroquois horror, but it may 

 be just as deadly, after all ; and when people are killed 

 by a lack of air to breathe, there are usually months 

 and even years of suffering, and long strings of expen- 

 sive bills for doctors and nurses. Is not one almost as 

 bad as the other ? 



