The Saint Paul globe., 1898-02-26

spend the fee she has paid for being
led. Such betrayal of confidence is bad
enough when the only result is fall
into the mire. How much worse is it
when the blind leader risks his clients
life-when the open ditch into which
she falls is an open grave?
Can such things be?
Such things are every day in this
greedy world of ours. Weak and suf
fering women, blind as to their own
needs, put their hands in confidence
into the hand of some self-styled lead
er, with the result that both fall into
the ditch of failure. and she, poor
thing, staggers on a few more PAGES
only to fall into the last ditch, the
"house appointed for all living"
An Experienced Expert Needed.
Let us drop all figures of speech and
face the facts frankly. Here are thou
sands of people suffering from disease
of one form or another. Sometimes the
seat Of disease is in the kidneys. some
times in the liver, sometimes it is the
heart that is affected and at other
times the lungs or the stomach. And
sometimes there is that general decay
that slow wasting, which we call con-
sumption. The cry of the sufferer is
for some one to lead him out Of this
desert of disease into the promised land
response to the cry. DO you know the
way to the land of health? Can you
! lead me there? Are you familiar with
| the road? Can you see plainly which
is the easiest path for my failing feet?"
All these questions the sufferer show
ers on the leader" And to all of them
! he answers with a satisfied yes" And
so he puts his hand into the hand Of
a blind guide, and they start on the
| journey. Not once in q hundred times
do they reach the land of health. The
result is failure, most disastrous and
most terrible. Do we want to discredit
the medical knowledge and ability of
the guides" of the land who treat
disease-the doctors who are the lead
ers to whom the sick intrust their
| lives? By no means. We only want
to call attention to a fallacy that is
behind all these failures, and that is,
| that a guide must not only be a guide
| by profession and license, but he must
| be also familiar with the territory in
which he works You wouldn't go on
| Broadway, New York, and select man
| to guide you through the Mammoth
| caves of Kentucky because he was the
most expert guide to the sights and
scenes of New York that money could
| hire. You wouldn't go to London and
pick out a man who knew every street
! and turn in the vast city as the most
| capable man to guide you across the
| trackless Sahara? You recognize that
! in these things a man must be spa-
| cialist A man may be a perfect New
! York guide and be an utter failure in
| London. 1t isn't the guides badge that
! makes a man q guide; 1t isn't his IL.
| cense by the city, is his practical
| experience in the locality in which he
works Apply this to medicine. Any
! physician is considered a safe guide out
of the condition of disease, because he
is an accredited physician. But is he
| safe? Does he know this particular
disease? Does he know it thoroughly,
| intimately. closely? K man may know
! London in a way. He may be able to
! follow the broad thoroughfares of OK
ford street, Piccadilly, Trafalgar
square, the Strand; but take him few
! blocks outside of the main arteries Of
| streets and alleys that lie barely out
! of sound of the roar of travel on these
| great th0roughfares, and he is hope
! lessly lost. SO it is in the treatment Of
a disease. Many physician knows it's
| broad symptoms. He is all right while
! it follows the general lines he is IA
miliar with Let it take him out Of
! the beaten path, into the labyrinth of
| symptoms that lie close by, and he is
! utterly lost. The only safe guide in
| disease is the man that can't get lost;
! the man who knows the alley and the
| cul-Qe-Sac as wen as ne Knows the
| main artery of travel; the man who
| knows not only what a disease is do
| ing, but what it can do, and can keep
! up with it in every turn and twist of
! its windings through vein, artery and
| nerve, or blood and brain.
Is There Such n Man?
Is there such a guide? There ought
! to be. Every city has it's man who
knows each street and building, who is
thoroughly conyersant with every
house and alley Of the town. The seas
and rivers have their pilots, who know
| every rock and shoal every eddy and
every current. The pathless prairie and
the dusty desert have their guides who
have lived their lives on these ex-
panses, and so as straight to a given
point as a homing pigeon to its cote.
Why should one fail of a safe guide in
! disease? There should be one and there
! is. But how shall we know that the
! guide is safe? Just as you'd know the
safety Of any guide by his success The
men who guided the great Cunard lin
| ers across the Atlantic ocean achieved
a record that in about a quarter of a
century they had never lost man or
! letter. People who put safety before
! show travelled by the Cunard. The AL
| pine guides that are chosen for traVers-
! ing the slippery slopes of the mountain
| and crevaSSe are chosen by the record