CHAPTER LXIX.

COLD-TAKING AND CONSUMPTION.

In Chapter XXIII., I have given a full account of my partial recovery from consumption. I have even spoken of the postponement as if it were complete and final. More than twenty years had now passed away, and I had begun to indulge the hope that I should never have another relapse.

As one element of this hope, I had nearly broken up the habit--once very strong--of taking cold, especially on my lungs. In truth, I believed all danger from this source to be entirely removed, and my particular susceptibility to any thing like acute pulmonary attacks forever at an end. I was confident, moreover, that the art of avoiding cold was an art which not only an individual, here and there, like myself, could acquire, but one which was within the reach of every one who would take the needful pains.

On a certain occasion of this latter kind, I was under a conventional necessity of exposing myself, in an unusual degree, for several successive evenings, to circumstances which, at an earlier period of my life, would, almost inevitably, have been followed by a cold. Was it safe, in my present condition, to run the risk? I hesitated for some time, but finally decided to comply with the request which had been made, and take the responsibility. I believed my susceptibility to cold so entirely eradicated that there was little if any danger.

But, as the event proved, I was quite mistaken; a severe cold came on, and left me in a condition not merely alarming, but immediately so. My lungs were greatly oppressed and my cough exceedingly severe and harassing; and it was followed with great debility and rapid emaciation.

Ashamed of myself, especially as I had boasted, for so many years, of an entire freedom from all tendencies of this sort, I endeavored, for a few days, to screen myself entirely from the public eye and observation. But I soon found that inaction, especially confinement to the house, would not answer the purpose,--that I should certainly die if I persisted in my seclusion.

What now should I do? I was too feeble to work much, although the season had arrived when labor in the garden was beginning to be needed. Trees were to be pruned and washed, and other things promptly attended to. The open air was also the best remedy for my enfeebled and irritated bronchial cavities. Whether there was, at this time, any ulceration of tubercles in my lungs, is, to say the least, very doubtful. However, I greatly needed the whole influence of out-of-door employment, or of travelling abroad; and, as it seemed to me, could not long survive without it.

Accordingly I took my pruning knife in my hand, and walked to the garden. It was about a quarter of a mile distant, and quite unconnected with the house I occupied. At first, it was quite as much as I could do to walk to the garden and return without attempting any labor. Nor could I have done even this, had I not rested several times, both on the road and in the enclosure itself.

It was a week before I was able to do more than merely walk to the garden and back, and perhaps prune a small fruit tree or shrub, and then return. But I persevered. It seemed a last if not a desperate resort; yet hope sometimes whispered that my hour had not yet come, that I had more work to perform.

At length I began to perceive a slight increase of muscular strength. I could work moderately a quarter of an hour or more, and yet walk home very comfortably. In about two months, I had strength enough to continue my labors several hours, in the course of a whole day, though not in succession--perhaps two in the forenoon and two in the afternoon. In about three months, I was, so far as I could perceive, completely restored.

It is to be remarked and remembered that, during the whole three months, I never took the smallest particle of medicine, either solid or fluid. My simple course was to obey, in the most rigid and implicit manner, all known laws, physical and moral. It was my full belief at that time,--it is still my belief,--that conformity to all the Creator's laws is indispensable to the best of health, in every condition of human life, but particularly so when we are already feeble and have a tendency to consumption.

When it became known to my neighbors, who saw me day after day, reeling to my garden or staggering home, that I refused to take any medicine, there was a very general burst of surprise, and, in some cases, of indignation. "Why," said they, "what does the man mean? He must be crazy. As he is going on he will certainly die of a galloping consumption. Any one that will act so foolishly almost _deserves_ to die."

As soon as I found myself fairly convalescent, I returned gradually to all those practices on which I had so long relied as a means of fortifying myself, but which, since my _fall_, had been partially omitted. Among these was bathing, especially cold bathing. To the last, however, I returned very cautiously. Not for fear I should not be able to secure a reaction, but rather for fear Nature would have to spend more _vitality_ during the process than she could well afford to spare.

I have known cases of the latter kind. An aged minister in Cleveland, Ohio, who had long followed the practice of cold bathing every morning, came to me in Dec. 1851, when the cold weather was very intense, and told me that though he could, with considerable effort, get up a reaction in his system after the bath, he was afraid it _cost_ too much. I advised him to suspend it a few weeks, which he did with evident advantage.

There are, however, many other things to be done besides giving due attention to cold bathing, if we would harden ourselves fully against taking cold, to which I should be glad to advert were it not foreign to the plan I had formed, and the limits which, in this work, I have prescribed to myself.