Tombstone epitaph., 1890-02-22
PULMONARY DISORDERS.
Out-DOor Air and Exercise the Best Rem
 edies for Consumption.

Out-DOor Air and Exercise the Best Rem
 edies for Consumption.
 In the course of the last fifty years a number of observant physicians have evinced a more and more outspol1en con- vlction that pulmonary disorders make no exception to the general rule that all diseases become more curable in cold weather. Three generations ago all lung troubles, almostl without an ex- ceptjon, were ascribed to the influence of cold air-a deIusion perpetuated in the still sadly misleading word ''cold" as synonym of catarrh and in the not yet quite obsolete fashion of sending cOnsumptives to an early grave in the sultry coast regions of the tropics. Cold night air, ''draughts" and ''raw March winds' had be- come the bugbears of Iung-sic'-
 sons. A disease due to low teu1pv.- ature seemed rE raiiv to dclsaa5 warmth for it's cure, and patients who could not afford the expense of a journey to Florida or the West Indies were kept penned up in the stifing atmosphere of an overloaded sick-room, with every breath of fresh air carefully excluded.
 Those delusiOnS were first shaken by the result of cOInpara tive statistics. The mortality records of every civilized country east, west, north or south dem- onstrated the suggestive fact that the prevalence Of consumption bears an ex- act proportion to the prevalence of in- door occupations. Tn pastoral Norway l. less frequent than in cotton-spinning England; in frosty Switzerland less ire quent than in sunny France. The unan- imous reports of Arctic travellers estab- lished the still more remarkable circum- stance that in the polar regions lung diseases are almost wholly unknown, due to diet of train oil, argued the old-school doctors. Let us try that specific" And the cod-liver-oil nuisance was added to other sorrows of afflicted mankind. Kohl, Father de Smeth and other explorers of the North American inland regions, in the meanwhile no- ticed that the hunting tribes of our frozen Northwestern prairies share the privilege of weather-proOf lungs at distance of 2,000 miles from the next train-oil kettle; while the reports of the Naples hospitals proved that the de- velopment of factory towns had made consumption extremely prevalent 1T. the more than half-tropical coast district of Southern Italy.
 At the same time experience had left no doubt that a change from indoor to outdoor occupations could, in four out of five cases, be relied upon to avert the doom of hereditary consumption. The siclly wives of Silesian weavers recov- cred from malignant lung disorders after the removal of their household to the backwoods of the Tennessee valley; hollow-cheeked mechanics, worn out with hectic coughs, became athletes by adopting an outdoor mode of life; of five sons descend, 9f0 n a1esstrg of consumptives, four died in city work shops before the completion of their fftieth year, while the fifth on his mountain farm outlived his nephews and grand-nephews. Consumption was gradually recognized to be house dis ease.
 It is true that the theory of the old school party is apparently supported by the circumstances that lung disorders become more frequent after the end of October, and subside about the middle of May; but should that phenomenon be wholly unconnected with the fact that winter is, by excellence, the season of indoor life? Savages, who spend their winters outdoors, and trappers in their draughty winter camps in the gully of a Western sierra, know catarrhs only from hearsay, and we have seen that the natives of the arctic regions share that immunity in spite of their ill., ventilated novels, which may keep out snow-fakes, but can not counteract the penetrative force of q polar winter storm.
 These facts suggest considerable mod ifcations in the conventional method of treating catarrhs and other disorders of the respiratory organs. They have all ready led to the practical lestablishmentof the truth that cold pure air, rather than warm foul air, is natures specific for the elimination of lung microbes, and scores of consumptives are actually cured by their removal from the sultry lowlands of the Mississippi valley to the frosty highland regions of the Adirondacks. For the same reason Dr. Lewis advised his lung-sick patients to take an extra dose of outdoor air in mid-winter, and it would not be a bad plan to utilize the coldest and driest breezes of every win ter for disinfeetant purposes. Just as the owners of new family residence celebrate a "hOuse-warming. old tene- ments should be treated to an occasional housekeeping Dr. T. L. Oswald, in Harper's Bazar.
 Amusing and Characteristic.
 A friend who has just returned from