CHAPTER LI.

SUDDEN CHANGES IN OLD AGE.

Mrs. N. was about seventy years of age. In her early years she had possessed a sort of masculine constitution; and though embarrassed by poverty, had reared a large family of children, who were all well settled in the world. She resided with the youngest but one of them, where she did just as she pleased. In short, she had a good home, and, had she enjoyed health, might have been happy.

But a change had come over her in point of health, which it was not so easy to account for at its outset as in its progress. For her first derelictions, at least, I know of no cause. But she had, at length, become reconciled to the use of tea, and as her spirits began to flag, she added to it strong coffee. From these she proceeded to the pipe.

The more she increased her extra stimulants, the more she added to her troubles, and the greater was her necessity for additional stimulus. Laudanum was very soon on her list; at first, it is true, in very small quantities. Yet, as she grew older, she found a necessity, as she verily believed, for increasing the size of her dose from year to year, till, at the age of seventy, I found her in the full and free use of tea, coffee, tobacco, and laudanum,--the latter to the enormous extent of half an ounce a day,--and yet her complaints were more numerous than ever.

She was a reasonable woman, and therefore I attempted to set forth, in their true colors, the realities of her condition. However, as I was not acting as her physician, but only as a friend, I had little hope of making any very permanent impressions. She knew the whole story as well as I or any one else could know it. The great difficulty under which she labored was a want of resolution to change her habits. Her irresolution was sustained by the belief--a very general one--that old people cannot make sudden changes in their physical habits with safety.[G] But she was unhappy in the condition she then was. She had no peace with conscience, nor, as I might almost venture to say,--for she was a religious woman by profession,--with God.

I assured her that the real danger of sudden changes, at her age, had been greatly overrated; though danger there certainly was, in greater or less degree. But I pointed out to her the means of obviating what danger there was, and urged her, as a Christian, to make up her mind to meet it. Of course, I did not presume to urge her to cast every thing aside, and return to Nature's path at once; but to drop first one thing and then another. I counselled her to be thorough and determined, as far as she went; and when she abandoned a thing to make no reserve, but to be sure of not going too fast and too far at once.

When I left her one day, after a somewhat protracted conversation, it was with many feelings of discouragement. I doubted very seriously whether, on the whole, she would move at all. The power of half an ounce of laudanum and a paper of tobacco daily, in paralyzing the human will, is very great. But she was one of those persons who cannot, or think they cannot, leave off a habit gradually, in the way I proposed. She must "go the whole figure," as it is said vulgarly, or do nothing at all.

Judge then, if you can, of my surprise, when about two months afterward I learned, from a source which was perfectly reliable, that the very next day after I saw her, she abandoned the whole herd of extra stimulants, both solid and liquid, and betook herself to water. Nor had it, so far as I could learn, at all injured her.

No sooner did I hear the news of her reformation, than I took my horse and made her a visit. There she was, nearly as well as ever she had been in her life, though perhaps a little paler and thinner. And oh, what rejoicing she had in her freedom! It would have done you good to see her. She had now no fears for the result. "True," she said, "I suffered for a few days, but the agony was soon over."

One thing should be mentioned, since it doubtless added to the dangers, real and imaginary, of her condition and trial. It took place during the middle of a very cold winter--one of the coldest which we of the North ever experienced; scarcely, if at all, behind those of 1855-6 and 1856-7.

But all persons have not Mrs. N.'s faith, nor her deep-abiding religious principles. These, it is presumed, greatly aided her in the terrible conflict. No one ought to attempt such changes, at least in life's decline, unless most fully convinced of their importance and necessity. Yet, _with_ this conviction, and strong faith in addition, all becomes comparatively easy.

Mrs. N. died a few years after her reform; but she died a free woman, and not a slave to her appetite. Some few there were of her acquaintance who appeared to think that the sudden changes to which she had subjected herself several years before, hastened her dissolution. But I do not believe there was a particle of evidence to be found that such was the fact. Reader, remember Mrs. N., and if you are in the road of error, and not more than seventy years of age, go and do likewise. If you have not _lived_ free, resolve at least to have the pleasure of dying so.

FOOTNOTES:

[G] This error has been met and refuted in the happiest manner, by the late lamented Dr. John C. Warren, of Boston, in his little work, entitled, "Hints for the Preservation of Health." Also, by Dr. Alcott's new work, "The Laws of Health."