The Grenada gazette., 1889-03-14
FOR THE SLEEPLESS.
Various Plans to Court Sleep
When It Is Say.
The Latest scie 'tilc Explanation Of the
Cause of Insomnia, and How Refresh
In. Sleep Can he Secured-Th1nk
of Old Dreams.


If any unusually acute inventor could
tell us of an infallible contrivance Tor
going to sleep just when we wish to do
50 there can be no doubt whatever oil
the substantial benefit which would
thereby be secured for mankind Some
fortunate individuals, like Napoleon L.
can command sleep the moment they
lay their heads on the pillows, others
find themselves all through life Sleep
ing the sleep of the just every night,
without any difficulty being expert
enced as to occasional wakefulness, ex-
cept when illness happens to inter-
vene.
The Duke Of Wellington, who always
slept on camp bedstead, had a max
i'm that when man turned in bed it
was time to turn out; and here it may
be remarked that great soldiers APP
pear to be peculiarly constituted IN
their power to summon sleep at will.
Possibly this may be due to the habits
of discipline which they have learned.
They say to their brains: go to
sleep" and at once tho word of COM
mand is obeyed. As I.
Insomnia, however, is an evil of
civilization which is growing, and if
the letter which correspondent has
addressed to weekly contemporary is
to be relied on plan has at last been
hit upon to cure the malady and to Sc
cure natures sweet restorer at mo-
nRnt's notice. We are all familiar
with the stereotyped advice in cases of
this kind to turn the pillow" to
think of something else" or to i'm
agine and count humber OF mountain
sheep going through a gate. Many a
time and oft has the too wakeful BRAIN
worker attempted TO carry these and
similar prescriptions into practice,
usually with results disproportionat
" the efforts involved.
1t may be said without much exag-
geratiou that the man who can first
imagine fock of sheep, then o half
open gate, and then can force his
hypothetical sheep to go through one
by one without crowding or dodging
or turning tail, is fit for treason,
strategems or writing the sublimest
poetry. He is no ordinary man, and
it is for ordinary individuals that tho
saving prescription is required.
What, then, does our latest savior of
society precisely recommend? First of
all he enters into sort of philosophic-
(, al rationale of sleep and no sleep. 1T
is now, believe" he writes, "gener-
ally accepted that our conscious day.
light-thinking processes are carried on
in the sinister haH.of our brains"-why
does he not say the left hall at once?-
THAT is, in the lobe which controls the
action OF the right arm and leg" He
has thought and thought again OF what
use 1.-THE dexter half of the BRAIN
could possibly be, and he concludes
that the right lobe is the organ which
is employed doing what is called ''un.
conscious cerebration" in table.turn-
ings and other spiritualistic manifesto
tions.
Now, during sleep we Unconscious,
ly cerebrate, which accounts for our
dreams being of character which the
correspondent only family describes
when he calls them fantastic, non-mor-
al and spritelike. Musing on these
matters. he came to the practical in
ference that to bring back sleep when
lost we must quiet the conscious, think
ing and left side OF our brains. and
bring into activity the right side alone
This sounds all very well, but it
might turn out very difficult to split
our brains into two halves and begin
using the right side when we want the
left to be employed. However. the
proof OF this particular prescription
of course lies in the question whether
1t really induces sleep or not.
ARMED with this idea." says the
commendable experimental corre-
spondent, 1.-THE next time / found my
self awakening at two o'clock in the
morning, instead OF merely trying to
baliish painful thoughts and repeating,
as was my habit, that recommendable
soporifc, Paradise and the Peri, l re-
verted at once to the dream from
which had awakened and tried to go
on with it. In u moment was asleep!
And from that time the experiment,
often repeated, has hardly ever failed.
Not seldom the result is sudden us the
fall Of curtain, and seems like
charm. , 4@.5 M
It would be more consoling II we
were told that the plan 'never" failed.
instead Of "hnrdly ever;" also we need
advice as 10 when person has had no
dream to think OF, Or can not for the
life VI him remember what. it was;
and obviously II Is IMPOSSIBLE TO begin
to think about our hast dream when
one has only just gone to bed. With
these deductions the plan may rs we'll
be worth trying rs any otlier. We can
not always hnvc n volume Of sermons
al our bedside.