Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-06-07

N rub or knead 1t for re
- - lief is common to civ
ilized man and saw
age. It is the effort to equalize circulation
and draw the blood from the injured part il
congestion, or bring back natural warmth in
collapse, for friction does both.
Like all healing methods in the hands Of
ignorant or unprinclpled practitioners,
massage is overdone till it becomes charla-
tanry. At the same time in wise hands il
is a blessed and signal relief, often super.
seding the painful operations of surgery
and drastic medicines. In condensing the
most interesting facts about it the names Of
Dr.. Weir Mitchell, Of Philadelphia, and
DR.. Douglas Graham, of Boston, will be
sufficient authority. DIR. Graham able and
scholarly book on massage Is the manual
for the profession, and massage enters
largely into DR.. Mitchell's famous cures of
nervous and spinal diseases.
Stories Homer Tells About Il.
! Massage originally is from the Arabic
word 'mass," meaning to press softly, but
rubbing, stroking, kneading and beating the
L
| Vienna, who drew modern attention to its
use about 1875, says that massage is as old
as surgery. Kneading, rubbing and work
ing the muscles to relieve fatigue was the
practice of savage and heroic nations from
the earliest times. DR.. Douglas reminds us
that Homer, in the odyssey" tells how
beautiful women rubbed and anointed war
worn heroes to rest and refresh them
where, we read, the fair Polcaste, youngest
daughter of Nestor, bathed Telemaohus,
"and after she had bathed and anointed him
with olive oil and cast about him goodly
mantle he came forth from the bath feeling
like the deathless gods"
In those days of heroic simplicity it prob
ably was no more for a woman to rub and
anoint man worn out with fighting men of
his own mettle. through days Of fasting, heat
and watchings than for hospital nurse to
tend a man aching SO from wounds he does
not know whether men, women or demons
attend him. But ancient and modern chari-
ties of this sort are equally removed from
the hideous massage madams who make
themselves and their art disreputable.
Early Masters Of the Art.
In the fifth century B. c., Herodicus, one
of the masters of the healing art, prolonged
the lives of his patients by exercise and rub
bling, and also cured himself of weakness
spdll heslth-thist lt that be lived to be 100 as we
read in Hufeland's 'krt- of frolonsine
Life" Herodotus speaks of the Egyptian
massage and amounting. The fathers of
medicine abound with Recommendation of
massage, and it compels our respect for the
sages to hear Hippocrates repeating truths
whose importance experienced masseurs can
fully appreciate. Suitable massage knits
slack and rickety joints by stimulating their
circulation, nutrition and innervation, while
with proper friction a stiff joint becomes
flexible.
The fact that rubbing can make flesh ana
cause it to waste is often observed in mas
sage, of which DR.. Graham says: "People
sometimes lose much adipose tissue, to their
detriment, by the excessive use of massage.
But this can be used to advantage where fat
is superabundant, with want Of tone and
tension, for in these it will be found that
hard rubbing binds. Soft rubbing loosens
not only tough and matted conditions of
skin and superficial muscles, but also in
voluntary tension of muscles found in over
taxed and debilitated people. Here comes
the necessity of careful discrimination, for
if patient in such condition receives such
vigorous rubbing as passes for massage in
these days the trouble would probably be
aggravated, for greater tension would be ex-
cited by the pressure of friction and manipu.
lation upon terminal nerve flaments already
in state of irritation.
All Persons Cannot Stand 1t.
It takes certain amount of strength to
bear massage, and nervous high-strung wo-
men sometimes are not at all improved by
it, soothing as it may Immediately seem.
Ny own last experience of massage by a
trained operator produced sort Of an in
e1o for ho1f fo1I H.
intolerable wakefulness the entire night, as
it had taken strong coffee.
Massage is nowhere better. understood at
the present day than among the Sandwich
Islanders, from whom it is to be hoped some
enterprising traveller will import the art
and practitioners together. As travelling in
those islands must be done on foot or horse
back, long distances over rough roads, life
would miss one of its greatest alleviations
without this massage, or lomi-lomi, as the
natives term it. When footsore, weary and
sleepless with aching joints after a journey
the consequences with us would be days of
stupor and lameness. But the Hawaiian
civilization sends relief in the shape of an
expert with firm, soft touch, who comes to
your mat as you lie in a single garment, and
skillfully kneads, works and strokes each
wearied muscle from head to foot and
charms each pain away. Mr.. Nordhof's de-
scription will be remembered by all readers:
Quickly Relieves Headache.
"Almost everywhere you find some one
skilled in this peculiar, delightful and re-
freshing treatment. A stout native, be-
ginning with your head and working slowly
downward over the whole body, seizes and
squeezes with a quite peculiar art every
tired muscle, working and kneading with
indefatigable patience, until in half an hour
you find yourself fresh, all soreness and
WEAKNESS absolutely gone and mind and
body soothed. The lomiIomis, is used not
merely for overexertion, but to relieve rheu-
matte and neuralgia pains. I have known
it to relieve violent headaches in very
short time"
Any one who has been under the hands of |
a clever masseur will regret that the lomi-
lomi experts have not long since been i'm
ported to train few thousand men and |
women in the art SO greatly needed in our
nervous and sedentary race. The chiefs |
keep number of lomi-lomi people in their |
retinue, and DR.. Emerson says the chiefs |
are 25 per cent larger and taller than the |
subjects, because better fed and more con-
stantly lomi-lomied. In cases of stunted |
growth, probably nothing would so effectu-
ally increase the stature as abundance of
pure air, strong food and skilful daily mas
sage. /
A Rubbing for Lawyers Heads.
It was proposed few years since by