CURING A COLD. 303 



too feeble to execute them ; at that time, had it not been that my strength had 

 surrendered to a succession of assaults from infallible remedies for my cold, I 

 am satisfied that I would have tried to rob the graveyard. Like most othqr 

 people, I often feel mean, and act accordingly ; but until I took that medicine I 

 had never revelled in such supernatural depravity, and felt proud of it. At the 

 end of two days I was ready to go to doctoring again. I took a few more 

 unfailing remedies, and finally drove my cold from my head to my lungs. 



I got to coughing incessantly, and my voice fell below zero ; I conversed in a 

 thundering base, two octaves below my natural tone ; I could only compass my 

 regular nightly repose by coughing myself down to a state of utter exhaustion, 

 and then the moment I began to talk in my sleep, my discordant voice woke me 

 up again. 



My case grew moi-e and more serious. every day. Plain gin was recom mended ; 

 I took it. Then gin and molasses ; I took that also. Then gin and onions ; I 

 added the onions, and took all three. I detected no particular result, however, 

 except that I had acquired a breath like a buzzard's. 



I found I had to travel for my health. I went to Lake Bigler with my repor- 

 torial comrade, Wilson. It is gratifying to me to reflect that we traveled in 

 considerable style ; we went in the Pioneer coach, and my friend took all his 

 baggage with him, consisting of two excellent silk handkerchiefs and a daguer- 

 reotype of his grandmother. We sailed and hunted and fished and danced all 

 day, and I doctored my cough all night. By managing in this way, I made out 

 to improve every hour in the twenty-four. But my disease continued to grow 

 worse. 



A sheet-bath was recommended. I had never refused a remedy yet, and it 

 seemed poor policy to commence then ; therefore I determined to take a sheet- 

 bath, notwithstanding I had no idea what sort of arrangement it was. It was 

 administered at midnight, and the weather was very frosty. My breast and back 

 were bared, and a sheet (there appeared to be a thousand yards of it) soaked in 

 ice-water, was wound around me until I resembled a swab for a Columbiad. 



It is a cruel expedient. When the chilly rag touches one's warm flesh, it 

 makes him- start with sudden violence, and gasp for breath just as men do in the 



