HEADACHE. 327 



deserve a word of passing notice. For instance, holding the arms aoov^ ths 

 head will often relieve the severity of that peculiar morning headache with which 

 some persons constantly awake. Again, compression of the temples with a couple 

 of pads and a bandage sometimes affords marked relief. The effect of pressure 

 did not escape the observation of Shakespeare. When Othello, after listening 

 to the insinuations of lago, tried to conceal his feelings from Desdemona by 

 the plea of headache, she replies : 



" Faith, that's with watching ; 'twill away again : 

 Let me bind it hard, within this hour 

 It will be well." (Act iii., Scene 3.) 



And again in King John, in the scene between Hubert de Burgh and Arthur, the 

 latter, when- petitioning for the preservation of his sight, says : 



" When your head did but ache 

 I knit my handkerchief about your brows 

 (The best I had, a princess brought it me) 

 And I did never ask it you again : 

 And with my hand at midnight held your head." 



(Act iv., Scene 1.) 



Sometimes the application of ice to the head, cold lotions, or eau-de-cologne will 

 do good. A recent writer recommends brushing the hair and " shampooing." He 

 says : " Amongst other accessories for the relief of headache, I would mention the 

 value of having the hair sharply and vigorously brushed by a hair-dresser during the 

 coming on of a headache; and the circular brush that is prompted to action by 

 machinery is more soothing in its influence than the ordinary brush when controlled 

 solely by the hand of man. For a neuralgic headache and for rheumatism of the 

 scalp, the circular brushing by machinery is only equalled by the comfort of sponging 

 the head with hot water ; and it outvies the sponge inasmuch as the patient has 

 nothing to fear from catching cold after the operation. The so-called " shampooing," 

 will afford relief in some cases ; but then, it requires a very nice and delicate adjust- 

 ment of hot and cold douches ; for though the warm douche will sooth the poor, 

 irritated nerves, yet, if the officiating priest of the bath is too sudden and too violent 

 in his outpouring of cold water, he will nullify the good effects of his warm waterfall 

 by giving the nerves a shock for which their strength is barely equal These details 

 may appear trivial to some readers, but I appeal to a headaching audience, and they 

 will, I know, bear me out in my assertion, that it is one thing to be coaxed and 

 soothed by circular brushes and intelligent splashings of warm and cold water, and 

 it is quite another to have a short-bristled brush rattled over your aching head with 

 a charming disregard to the sensitiveness of the nerves of the scalp, and to the com- 

 parative value of bristles or boxwood in smoothing people's hair and temper. I have 

 sometimes shuddered for my turn to come in a hairdresser's room, when I have seen 

 the brush handled by a clumsy apprentice, and heard it tap and rattle against the 

 scalp of some confiding customer." Galvanism occasionally proves useful in headache, 

 and sometimes benefit is derived from freezing the skin of the forehead by means of 

 the ether spray, although the latter mode of treatment, we are inclined to think, is 

 more applicable to true neuralgia. 



