Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1881-03-03

Music touches her softeSt and sweetest
notes in slumber-songs. We salute it
in unnumbered graceful phrases as our
chief OF blessings. Yet in practice we
are most careless of the beneiicent
guest, and cut ourselves off from her
finer ministries. if we donot bia her be-
gone altogether.
To drop metaphor. which. like NAL
volio's crosS-gartering. Constructs the
blood" the cOmmOnest OF modern dis
orders among the educated classes is an
inability to sleep. Nor is this slight
matter. While the agencies of repair
are ever at work to replace the constant
wear of vitality, it is only in sleep that
the rate of waste falls below that of re-
placement. so that there is any real ac-
emulation of nervous force. And
since nervous force is not only fuel. but
driving-rod and stoker to this human
engine, its wheels must turn slowerand
slower without that supply, till present
ly they stop.
Common-sense and knowledge are
the greatest physicians since -Escula-
Plus. though Their practice is but small.
Now knowledge explains that, paradox
ical AS it NAV at first seem. nervous
temperaments do not require the same
amount of sleep as phlegmatic ones.
The dull, leihargic and slow organiza-
ton makes a ponderous business Of its
slumber. as of the other allotments of
life, and takes nine or ten hours to get
through with it. The quick, electric.
1.-THE. sensitive person, on the other
hand, whose processes are swift as air,
takes in his sleep. apparently, as he
does his ideas, at flash. and finds his
six hours Inconsistencies fuller of as
sanitation than his fellow ten. The
temperament acts throughout.
Moreover, from the days of Hippoc-
rates and Arateus. science has de-
clared that too much sleep impairs the
forces OF the brain. and with them all
the vital powers. So that the nervous
may take comfort, nor be alarmed at an
unseasonably late coming of the sleepy
mood. or its unseasonably early flight.
Some of the world most efficient
workers have been men who took in
credibly little sleep. as John Hunter.
the great Psychologist, John Wesley
and Napoleon.
But what slumber these toilers al
lowed themselves was sound and re-
freshing, and that is the thing to be in
sisted on. especially with those of us of
whom Nature unaccOuntablv forgot to
make Napoleons AMI Wesleys. while
she has limited our capacity to sleep.
And on this point Common-Sense would
be heard.
There is no doubt that most bad
sleepers. observes that eminent au-
thority. pass their nights under bad
conditions. The bedroom is an unre-
garded place. make-shift. convent
ent receptacle for a bed. bureau and
wash-stand. or perhap. q showroom OF
handsome cabinet furniture and lace
coverlets. But far too seldom is il the
cheerful, quiet. wel-aired. well-sunned,
widespread temple of slumber which
ed for lodgings. or examined houses
with intent to hire or buy. has been
shown innumerable inner rooms. or
"aicoves," or closets lighted only from
the top. with the information that
- that viii make most convenient
bedroom Or the seeker for summer
board has discovered tina, the chambers
are on the damp and shady side of the
house. chimneyless. and with windows
fixed at the top.
These disclosures reveal the popular
estimate of the dignity of the bedroom
in the household order. But he who
would sleep well must inhabit room
open daily to the free winds of heaven.
summed, also, if that be possible, clean
with spotless cleanliness (where no
venerable wallpaper and ancient up
holstery harbor ancestral foulness). and
disinfected as well with some of the
potent and odorless prophylactics'of the
day. Especially should he not keep
gas burning there for long evening.
or even to read himself to sleep. For
not only does the flame exhaust the air,