Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1888-02-15
THE IIYP0CH0NDRIAC.
EXPERT sNCE OF A MAN AS HE DRAWS
NIGH TO MIDDLE AGE.

A Case of Consumption Changes TO Cam
cer-Rheumatism and Heart Disease.
Haunted by Every Form Of Physical
Disaster-Tho Whole List.
A man reaches the age of 10 or Whereabouts
without having experienced any serious in
terruption in the current of his life. Some
night he is sleepess; the next day he is tired.
He has overworked, or overdrank, or over
smoked, or overworried. There is an extra
weight attached to his forehead, his legs are
weak and he is possessed by lasstude. He
recalls at once the death of "a man who fell
suddenly in the street, smitten by apoplexy.
The weakness in his legs, is not that symptO-
matte of paralysisi
He has passed his prime, and does not
know it. He Is ignorant of the fact that he
cannot labor as hard, drink as much and
employ his energies before Nature be-
gins TO slacken in her efforts at recuperation.
Night, with its rest and slumber, does not
bring him a morning with all its old time
buoyancy and exhilaration. Noticing these
things, he commences to examine his condi-
tion. The moment he begins this process of
self inspection he enters on the condition of
the hypochondriac
He catches little cold and has a cough
the newspapers catch his eye, and he sees
Consumption Cured" He reads it with
avidity, Symptoms are described and with
pang he feels that each one of them applies
exactly to his case. He hunts over the rec
ord of his ancestors to find if there be weak
lungs in the descent. Alas, yes! His grand
mother, he recalls, with painful shrinking
of the heart, died Of consumption at the age
of 93l And there were two second cousins,
both of whom, while quite young, fell vic
tim to this frightful nalady. He is doomed
A CANCER, SURE
The cough disappears. There is a sore on
his tongue, and almost instantly there comes
into the horrible vision cancer! He reads up
the encyclopedia on cancer; he takes furtive
gances into the books of medical friends, and
everywhere he finds confederation of his be-
lief. 1t is cancer, sure! His broken slumber
is filled with images of the hideous tumor,
and he listens with intense and painful inter
est TO the variations of those whose expert
ence includes the ulcer, the treatment of the
patient by the knife of the surgeon and the
fearful death at last of the unfortunate vic
tim. Finally he goes to the physician who,
if he be honest, assures him that his fears are
groundless, and then for brief season he is
at ease.
There comes a pain in his ankle or knees
Rheumatism. And now it moves to another
point Migratory, is it9 All, it is moving
toward his heart! 1t may leap there to-
night, tomorrcw, any moment; and again
he suffers the agony of dissolution, as he an
ticipates each moment feeling the pang of
the thrust of the deadly dart
He rushes hastily up a stairway, and he
feels an increased action in his heart At
once the dread vision of heart disease flashes
into his line of vision For months he broods
over the calamity which has overtaken him
He moves about carefully; he avoids every
thing which will produce excitement; he is
as careful of his heart as if it were a new
born babe.
He has a stuiiiness in his nose or throat,
and at once he has catarrh, combined with
bronchitis. There are prickling neuralgia
pains in his muscles, and he at once reads up
on the matter and finds that they are pre-
monitory symptoms of paralysis.
This self inflicted invalid reads the news
papers. Every case of death from paress
atfrightS him. He learns with fresh accesions
OF horror of hemiplegia and paraplegia, and
is certain that he is menaced with one of
these forms Of disaster. The age of every
man whose death is reported excites in him
painful interest If the deceased be younger
than himself he experiences a poignant pauG;
if older, then he has a faint hope that his own
end is not yet imminent.