ASTHMA. 125 



of asthma. It is a good practical rule, that any one subject to asthma should not take 

 solid food for five or six hours before retiring to rest. If a man goes to bed at 

 t \\vlvr, he should take nothing to eat after six o'clock. He should at all times 

 carefully abstain from taking anything commonly reputed to be indigestible. All 

 \vd things are to be avoided. Potted meats, dried tongue, sausages, stuffing 

 and seasoning, preserved ginger, candied orange-peel, dried figs, almonds and raisins, 

 everything of this kind is to be regarded with suspicion. Cheese is bad, especially if 

 old ; and it has been said that there is "as much asthma in a mouthful of decayed 

 Stilton as in a whole dinner." Nuts are especially likely to excite asthma. Meat- 

 pies are very " asthmatic," so, in a peculiar degree, for some reason or other, are 

 beef-steak and kidney puddings. As we have already seen, coffee taken as a beverage 

 with meals is particularly likely to bring on asthma. The after-dinner cup of coffee 

 is seldom admissible. For breakfast, it will usually be found that tea is better than 

 coffee, cocoa better than tea, and milk and water better than either. Heavy malt 

 liquors, especially those containing much carbonic acid gas, as bottled stout and 

 Scotch ale, are, of all drinks, the worst for asthma. 



Over-distension of the stomach is very apt to bring on asthma. An asthmatic's 

 meals should always be small in quantity, as nutritious as possible, and of easy 

 digestion. The tendency of eating to induce asthma is in direct proportion to the 

 lateness of the hour at which the meal is taken : it is slight after luncheon, worse 

 after a late dinner, worst of all after supper; whilst breakfast is entirely free from it. 

 As breakfast is the least likely of all meals to do harm, the sufferer from asthma 

 need not hesitate to take advantage of the fact, and should make a good one. In 

 fact, in the case of people whose time is practically their own, there is no reason why 

 the first meal of the day should not be to all intents and purposes dinner, the usual 

 order of the meals being reversed. 



Curiously enough, many asthmatics never suffer from their complaint in certain 

 localities. In some cases the foul and murky atmosphere of a crowded city proves more 

 beneficent than the clear and purer air of the country. People tormented at home 

 and coming to London for medical advice, often find themselves on their arrival 

 suddenly and thoroughly freed from their accustomed malady ; and are sometimes 

 vexed that, however long they may wait, they get no opportunity of letting their 

 chosen physician witness an attack. On their return to the country their complaint 

 quickly resumes its habitual tyranny. In these cases, the densest, lowest, and most 

 foggy parts of the city usually furnish the surest defence against the assaults of the 

 disease. The history is related of a great sufferer from asthma, who was accidentally 

 detained one night in the foul region of Seven Dials. He felt persuaded that he 

 could not possibly survive till morning, so great was his dread of the close atmo- 

 sphere. He not only lived through the night, however, but enjoyed the first uninter- 

 rupted sleep he had known for months. He took the hint, removed to Seven Dials, 

 for the benefit of the air, and from that time never suffered another attack. We 

 would advise residents in the country, whose life is rendered miserable by constant 

 attacks of asthma, to see what London air will do for them. It is probable that 

 there is nothing peculiar in London except so far as this, that it is a thickly covered, 

 densely populated, smoky city. We imagine that in the same class of cases any 



