AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



239 



store for you ?" The happy child will 

 not suspend his sports even long enough 

 to listen to your sad forebodings. 



I have often thought, that, but for the 

 special mercy of our loving Father in 

 freeing me, when well, almost entirely 

 from dismal apprehensions, I could never 

 have lived and retained my reason so 

 long beyond the period usually allotted 

 to man. 



I should here- say, that, in my worst 

 attacks, I was never subject to any 

 illusions. I always knew that physical 

 causes mainly were at the bottom of my 

 sufferings, and felt sure that, as soon 

 as these disappeared, I should be happy 

 again. But as, in my cheerful moods, I 

 seldom felt any dread of the future, yet 

 when under the power of the disease, it 

 was almost impossible for me to even 

 conceive how I could ever be well and 

 happy again. 



While the nauseated stomach rejects 

 the most wholesome food, the patient 

 knows all the time that this is only dis- 

 ease ; but this knowledge not only fails 

 to stimulate his appetite, but it seems to 

 him almost impossible even to imagine 

 how he can ever want to eat again. 



Since my recovery, in the fall of 1887, 

 I found that I>r. Prezinger's treatment 

 had not been continued long enough to 

 complete the cure ; but as soon as the 

 relapse was fully established, no persua- 

 sions of my family could induce me to 

 submit to further treatment. 



In revising this statement, I ought to 

 correct what I said about there never 

 being but one issue to an attack after 

 its incipient stages were clearly devel- 

 oped. In the fall of 1853 I was as much 

 depressed as I had ever been, when, by 

 the kindness of friends, I was able to 

 visit a brother who was residing in Mat- 

 amoras, Mexico. While traveling by 

 steamboat, railroad and stag^e-coach to 

 New Orleans — a journey which then 

 occupied over a week — I recovered en- 

 tirely before I reached that city, and 

 had an unusually long interval of com- 

 plete relief. 



Also, on another occasion while great- 

 ly despondent, I was summoned, at the 

 expense of one of the parties, as a wit- 

 ness in a suit at htw, which had been 

 brought against him for an alleged in- 

 fringement on the right of another 

 patentee. The entire change of scene, 

 with all its many diversions, completely 

 cured me. But for these instances, I 

 might naturally infer that time was the 

 only remedial agency, and that the dis- 

 ease could never be arrested, but must 

 always run its usual course. 



Among the many mistakes of my life, 

 I count this to be one of the greatest, 

 that, instead of seeking an entire change 

 as soon as I begin to feel the approach of 

 another attack, I have usually refused 

 to admit the possibility of succumbing 

 to it, and have struggled against it until 

 no power of will was left for further 

 conflict. Those who know how large a 

 portion of my life I have lost by this 

 disease will not be surprised at my un- 

 willingness to quit my work, when to 

 give it up often meant to forego oppor- 

 tunities never to be recalled. Besides 

 all this, I have usually been so straitened 

 for means that it has been very difficult 

 for me to give up my necessary avoca- 

 tions for change of scene. 



With thankfulness to God I can truly 

 say that few men have had better 

 friends, and that there has never been a 

 time when I might not have secured 

 means for travel and change of occupa- 

 tion simply by applying to them. But I 

 have received so many favors, often 

 most unexpected and entirely unsolicited, 

 that it is only with extreme reluctance 

 that I have been able to ask assistance 

 of even my most intimate friends and 

 relations. It may well be that some of 

 them will be pained to know that I did 

 not do so, when a little timely aid might 

 have preserved me from long periods of 

 suffering and inactivity. For the many 

 favors I have received from bee-keepers 

 at home and abroad, and from personal 

 friends and relations, I hereby tender 

 my most heartfelt thanks. 



No doubt some of my readers will 

 blame me for spending so much time, 

 when under the power of melancholy, in 

 playing chess, even though I tempted 

 nobody else to waste any time upon it. 

 But I most devoutly believe, that, in 

 fighting such a malady, the end fully 

 justifies all means which are not in 

 themselves immoral. It would be well, if 

 it were plainly understood, and more 

 fully realized, that, by dwelling too long 

 upon painful subjects, we may at last 

 lose mental control and become abso- 

 lutely insane, there is no doubt that 

 many who have strong hereditary ten- 

 dencies that way may, by wise foresight 

 and strong effort, counteract them. 



The following true story will make 

 more emphatic the above remarks : 



About 50 years ago the Rev. Dr. 

 Walker, who was a pastor of the Con- 

 gregational church in Brattleboro, \'i.. 

 exchanged pulpits with me. On Satur- 

 day evening his wife spoke of the sing- 

 ular state of mind into which a well- 

 known minister had fallen. He had 



