THE REMEDIES OF NATURE. 805 



cause remains can bring only temporary relief, or even increases the 

 subsequent malignity of the disorder. Strong black tea may thus act 

 as a charm — for a day or so ; but with the next morning the trouble 

 not only returns, but returns aggravated by the supposed remedy, for 

 chronic headache has no more potent single cause than the habitual use 

 of narcotic drinks. A frugal, non-stimulating regimen, on the other 

 hand, brings help more slowly but permanently, unless the patient 

 abuses the restored vigor of his digestive organs. Acute headaches can 

 generally be traced to influences which tend to obstruct the free circu- 

 lation of the blood — tight clothing, coldness of the extremities, op- 

 pressive atmospheric conditions, etc. — and can be cured only by a 

 direct removal of the cause. As a symptomatic result of a vitiated 

 state of the humors, as in scrofula and venereal diseases, headaches 

 that defy all medicine often yield to a grape-cure.* 



IIeart-bukn^, or Caedialgia. — Both words are misnomers, the 

 seat of the pain being the pit of the stomach, and the cause gastric 

 acidity ; remedies — fasting and " passive exercise," a ride in a jolting 

 cart, kneading of the abdomen, etc. 



Hypochondria, Chronic Melancholy, Spleen. — Robert Burton, 

 in his "Anatomy of Melancholy," enumerates some six thousand 

 causes of chronic despondency, and about as many different remedies, 

 of which only six or seven are apt to afford permanent relief : fru- 

 gality, temperance, early rising, life with a rational object (altruistic, 

 if egotism palls), constructive exercise in the open air, a sunny cli- 

 mate, and social sunshine — the company of children and optimists. 



Insomnia. — The proximate cause of sleeplessness is plethora of 

 the cerebral blood-vessels, and a palliative cure can be effected by 

 anything that lessens the tendency of the circulation toward the head. 

 But a permanent cure may require time and patience. By night-stud- 

 ies brain-workers sometimes contract chronic insomnia in that woi-st 

 form which finds relief only in the stupor of a low fever, alternating 

 with consecutive days of nervous headaches. Reforming topers often 

 have to pass through the same ordeal, before the deranged nervous 

 system can be restored to its normal condition. Fresh air, especially 

 of a low temperature, pedestrian exercise, and an aperient diet, are 

 the best natural remedies. Under no circumstances should sleepless- 

 ness be overcome by narcotics. An opium torpor can not fulfill the 

 functions of refreshing sleep ; we might as well benumb the patient 

 by a whack on the skull. 



Jaundice. — Jaundice and chlorosis are kindred affections, and 

 the yellow tinge of the skin is often in both cases due to an impover- 

 ished state of the blood — especially a deficiency in the proportion of 

 the red blood-corpuscles — rather than to a diffusion of bilious secre- 

 tions. Jaundice, as a consequence of obstinate agues, is evidently the 

 result of a catalytic process which disintegrates the constituent parts 

 * " Enteric Disorders," " Popular Science Monthly," vol. xxiv, p. 467. 



