The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1896-08-31
Ideas for GMnr1en,

.sThe extent to which women drug
themselves with patent medicines would
hardly be credited by any reasoning being
until she had lived in the house with one
of these friends and seen for herself just
how much the slave of this dreadful habit
a woman can become
This was the speech which proceeded
from the pretty lips of one of Philadei-
phia's best known athletic women. You
mustn't think she said, laughing, that
I am one of these dreadful crusading
women ana that the ext of my sermon
is the patent medicine man and his evil
doings. Some medicines of this kind are
excellent. myself have had recourse to
them, and you know that I am very
little in need of medicines as a general
thing. T>Sre are some people ! know
who think thai in order TO be Of use
medicine must be prescribed by a physi-
clan ana made up before your eyes by
the apothecary; tina anything which
does not cost q stiff price is quack.
This seems to NE rather an absurdity,
especially since many of the simple RENE
dies sold have been known to act well
on occasion. But what is a~ggravating
to every sensible woman is this drink
ing of medicine wholesale. 1t is d hor-
rible thing to think of. but I know more
than one nice little woman with whom
the liking for these stuffs has become a
veritable thirst, like that Of a drunkard
for his spirits"
You think that there should be a gold
cure instituted where a woman could go
to be cured of her thirst for drugs?" !
asked. laughing.
.Indeed, It really amounts to some
thing almost as bad as that. I was stay
ing this summer with a school friend of
mine in the suburbs. She had been mar
ried since last had seen her and had
been left a widow. When / arrived there I
was horror-stricken at her appearance.
This begins to sound like an advertise
ment for some drug: but it isn't. 1t
won't end up in a reference to Mrs.
Somebody's Specific Regulator Or any
thing of that kind. I only want to tell
you how this woman was hooding her
system with unnatural and unnecessary
remedies. Her skin was yellow-not a
bit of color. She spent most Of the time
on a sofa and had hardly energy enough
to drag herself upstairs. That woman
hardly spent fifteen minutes per day out
of doors, and then it was usually in a
rocking chair upon the porch. She didn't
take any exercise to speak Of except
a little pottering about the house. And
the place was Uttered with bottles of
every size and description under the
sun. It looked to me as if enough medi-
cine had been swallowed TO buy a bicycle
of the very best variety, a golfing out
fit. tennis requirements and a dozen other
sporting kits.
II knew that my friend was quite well
enough off to make a few purchases
more or less a matter Of small moment.
So 1 sat down and wrote a note to a
dealer in sporting goods ordering a
wheel, a punching ball, chest weights,
dumb bells, and. in fact, I went through
the category of simple exercises.
"When the wheel came she was as
tonished, of course, but / mounted her
upon it without waiting for a word Of
objection. Within three days she had
developed a real cycling passion. The
only fear was that she would oyerdo the
thing. The chest weights and the rest
of It came later. And, as you may
imagine. the medicine bottles languished
from that moment. Tha was two
months ago. 1 wish you could see that
little woman now. She has good color.
a very active appetite and she looks
fully fifteen years younger.
The great trouble with these medicine
passions Isl continued the interesting
young athlete, SIS that women get to rely
upon them instead of upon what nature
ordains. A woman grows to imagine that
this stuff is going to supply the want of
healthy exercise and healthy food and
good sound sleep. But is isn't. Far from
it,
TOO often the idea thai she is i'll makes
a woman go about curing herself in just
the wrong way. She fmagines that Civ
ing play to her muscles is bad. and that
systematic moving of her body must be
guarded against as a plague would be.
She accordingly spends months. chiefly
in lying on a sofa and weakens herself
10 a degree. And the food with which she
expects TO nourish her systems 1t is pitt
able. OF course, the medicines, in such
quantities and varieties make her diges-
tion very weak. and of course, she feels
unable to force herself to eat something
strengthening, which would help to con-
Quer these bad effects.
"As q general thing the woman who is
a slave to this habit neglects the use of
good ripe fruit, which no really athletic
woman thinks of going without. She eats
vegetables, sometimes. But vegetables in
their purpose and effects are different
from fruit and cannot supply the need.
And meat! TIL medicine woman, as one
usually finds her, does not eat enough
meat. A lamb chop of the size Of a nut
every other day is what most women of
this class partake Of in the way OF meat
nourisament. And what strength can such
a meal be supposed to impart? Good NUT
ton and roast beef. and SO on. are the
things for that. The wing of a weed
bird as Lord Dundreary suggests, would
not be very much Of an exaggeration in
this case.
Staying indoors is a habit which many
. woman has a hard struggle to over
come. even now when to be up-to-date.
one must spend at least half her day out
OF doors. I nave often heard women urge
that indoor work-sweeping, busting ana
so on-was the best variety of exercise
But this Is mere twaddie, as any good
doctor tells one.
In the first place, these things are
done indoors in stuffy atmosphere or in
1rouCh4a U,xxou :f 49, $3.50