Springfield globe-republic. (Springfield, Ohio) 1884-1887, 1885-01-04

fare. But it is a form of words without
any definite meaning. The do in it,
however, seems to imply activity. How
do you do life, how do you do the world?
You are expected to answer for your wax
ing, busy hours.
But how do you sieepH would be a
question really more pertinent to what we
are supposed to be asking about. For
man is not worth much for either enjoying
or doing, unless he is good sleeper. He
is not fully awake or healthy, if he has
not sufficiently slept. America is swarm
ing with men who have not slept enough.
What is sleep? You have done it every
day, or light, since you were born; and
vet who of you have any definite notion
Of what it is? The good sleeper knows
tnat it is one Of the sweetest solaces Of
life; and that is all be cares to know about
it. He may join Sancho Panza in his
unconscious joke Of blessing the man
who invented sleep; but Sancho had about
as clear, though perhaps not quite SO hu-
morous, an idea of the invention" as he
has.
Let US try to tell him, and you, what
sleep is. Sleep is anemia Of the brain,
as the doctors would say. The doctors
are apt to say anamia when they mean
bloodlessness. Bloodlessness is an Anglo
Saxon word with rather fioppy tail;
and that is the reason the doctors do not
like 1t; but we understand it better than
their word, and you will catch the idea
more easily from it. Sleep, then, is blood
lessness of the brain, or the state of the
brain when there is little or no blood in it.
But perhaps you may not know that
blood is required in the brain. Then, you
will be surprised to learn that there is an
immense flood of it pouring into and
through and out Of your brain at this
very moment-or else you would be now
asleep over this article. While person
is awake the blood is flowing into his
brain in very river; and the wider-awake
he is and the more actively he is thinking,
the fuller and rapider the river runs.
Every thought yod have requires so much
blood to think it. And you can not put two
and two together in your mind to make four
without wasting some OF yoar brain-sub-
stance which waste the returning blood
carries out of the head and deposits in
the secretions that are to be carried
out of the body.
Then, after the brain has thus wasted as
much of itself as it can hesithfully spare
exhausted Itself-it wants to rest. The
blood, getting word by some mysterious
telegraphy that it is no longer needed up
stairs, remains below, and the person falls
asleep. But, if it refuses to obey the mes
sage sent down for it to keep away, and
insists on intruding itself into the upper
chamber in spite Of the occupants re-
moustranee, the brain submits to the in
terv.ew under protest; and insomnia, or
wakefulness, is the result. If the stream
of blood to the brain is diminished or re-
tarded, then there is state of browse.
A small blood-rill running in here and
there occasions dreams.
The blood is sometimes unreasonable
and goes on waltzing through the upper
chamber of the man when the brain is
tired out and disgusted with the dance.
In such case, it should be put to doing
something below. The work of digestion
requires large supply of it. Hence eat,
and give it occupation in the stomach. A
hearty meal makes you sleepy because the
blood is drawn away from the head to be
employed in the processes of digestion.
This is contrary to the old doctors the
ory. 1t used to be advised to go to bed on
an empty stomach. But since the adop-
ton of the new theory of sleep-and the
theory is quite recent-the physicians ad-
vice has changed. They note that hun
gry animal is wakeful, and that it gorges
itself and goes right to sleep. Every one
knows that he is sleepy after hearty
meal. The infant sleeps most OF the time,
and eats the rest of the time. Therefore
the new medical prescription for sleepless-
ness is food, and plenty of it. Give the
stomach something to do, and it will take
the blood away from the brain to do it
with; and blood away from the brain is
sleep.
And it matters little what kind of food
you eat, so that your stomach has the vim
to digest it. Active, healthful work of
the digestive organs is what is wanted for
solid sleep. II mince-pie or picked
pig's-foot will give your blood respectable
and steady employment for couple of
hours or SO, you will sleep as well on that
as on bread-and-butter. When the blood
has busted itself with pig s-foot till
twelve or one O'Clock it has forgotten to
banker after brains any more till morn
ing. So, if the reader is not already
asleep, he may eat a pig s-foor and 60 di-
rectly to bed.