The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1893-04-12
The AeralA and 0ers.
ARP IS AILING,
And He Concludes that Doctors are 1ndis-
pensable-His Sick Mule and the Neigh
bors' Suggestions

remember reading in Josephus CT
somewhere else that King Solomon
was the first great botanist, for he stud
led the properties and virtues Of every
plant from the fir tree to the hysop pthat
soringeth out Of the wal! and he knew
all the herbs that were good for man
for medicine. I wish that he had
handed down his wisdom so that we
poor suffering morta!s would know
what kind of bark or roots or herbs or
leaves to use when we get puny and
painted. Maybe he did hand it down
in the books tha. are lost, for the scrip
lures tell Us that all the rest Of the acts
OF Solomon are written in the books Of
Nathan, the Prophet, and Aljah and
lido, the seer. Maybe we will find
those books some of these days, for
there is railroad to Jerusalem now
and the investigating yankee is digging
away under the ruins of the temple.
They have recently found the stalls
where he kept his fine chariot horses,
/ 400 of them, and which were driven
by 700 handsome young men, who bad
gold dust spriukled in their hair every
morning and it sparkled in the sun
beams and made them look divine as
they circled around on dress parade.
That's what Josephus says.
But lam afraid the botany will come
too late for me and I will have to keep
on experimenting until something kills
or cures me. The trouble is that If a
sick man gets we'll be has taken so
many different medicines that he
doesn't know what cured him. I bad a
mule that liked to have died, and [ gave
him everything that the neighbors told
me, from lye soap and molasses to ker-
osene oil, and lastly we rubbed him
with rail ahdominally and horizon
tally until the hair all came off and he
got we'll, hut our next sick mule died
before We got to the rail aud the mule
doctors are still in the dark. I've been
reading good deal of late in a stand
ard book OF medicine and I found sew
enteen remedies for hemicrania and
twenty-seven for pertussis. One of
these diseases is neuralgia headache
and the other is whocping cough, but
sometimes forget which is tother and
take the wrong medicine. The head
ache belongs to me and the cough to
the little orphan, and the Mantleplece
and the bureau is full of bottles and vials
and capsules and tumblers and spoons,
the medicines have such curious names
on the labels that I forget which is
mine and which is the child's. Ny
doctor has given NE sven remedies
and charged me for every experiment,
but my neighbors have given me twen-
ty-seven free gratis and I think I am a
little better considering, but I can't tell
who's ahead, my neighbors or the doc
tor. fit wasn't for the intermissions
I couldn't get along at all, but almost
every day have lucid interval of q
few hours and that keeps up my hopes.
I have one now. I have been taking
horse radish and peppermint and tur-
pentine, not through my mouth, but
through the olfactory openings just
above, and experienced relief for time,
but it is slow business and wouldn't
MAKE 3 good perfume. have tried
antipirine and several ants, and the
girls oathe my throbbing temples with
camphor, and I tried gentian for the
last three days and now am on
half rations of salt dissolved in a tum-
bier OF water, which friend said was
the favorite remedy of Major Ca!npbel Il
Wallace, who is near ninety yesrs OF
age and there was no telling how long
8 man would live if he would use it. A
good female friend sent word to string
half dozen nutmegs on black thread
and tie them around the throat. The
word came to me and I bored holes in
them with an awl, stringed them and
went to bed with them on, but I found
out next morning that the nutmeg
business was for the whooping cough.
Another good neighbor sent word that
another woman told her that if I would
catch a roach and shut it up il little
paper box my headache would go of
when the roach gnawed out or died.
That reminds me Of old Uncle Ison,
whose remedy for rheumatism was to
mash lizards tail and let the reptile
lay under the doorsill until it died.
And that reminds me now how Neigh
Dor Freeman had two hound dogs that
wouldn't stay at home; so he cGrtailed
their tails about inches and buried the
fragments in the garden gate, and they
never roamed away any more. But the
like OF all that don't cure hemicranian
headache nor pertuSsian whooplng
cough, and to my opinion both will
have to be rursed until the weather
settles down and the east wind shifts to
the south and west and stays there.
They have called me to Brunswick to
lecture, and I am going where the salt
sea breeze will blow upon me gently;
and Pm going to take the child and her
mother and maybe we will all come
back rejuvenated and remunerated.
But I believe in medicine and in
doctors. We are bound TO have them.
Everybody can't so 10 Brunswick nor
to the Hot Springs, but the poorest
people can boil down bark and roots
and sheep saffron or something that
will amuse tie patient until nature
cures him. / believe that there is a
remedy for almost every disease except
old age, and the doctors are finding
them out. Whoo2ing cough ought to
he cured in twenty-four hours and it