The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1899-04-07
HEAT IN SICKNESS.
Therapeutic Effects of Hot Air Baths
as a Remedy for Various
DlaenReA.

One of the most potent remedial
agents known to science is heat. 1t has
been instinctively resorted to in oil
ages, in all countries apd among bar
barous as well as civilized peoples.
Rome in its palmy days had it's great
baths, such as Diocletian's and Cara
calais, covering many acres and fitted
up with great elegance with frescoes,
paintings and statuary. To these the
citizens resorted daily as the people of
the present day resort to the club.
These proved to be health preserving
10 such an extent that physicians were
not needed. Wherever the Roman
army was stationed the bath or Their
mae was established, as in Bath. Eng
land, so named because of the great
Roman bath which remains there and
is now utilized as Turkish bath.
When Christianity took possession of
Rome, strange to say, the authorities de-
stroyed the baths as pagan institutions,
and it remained for Mohammedan Tur-
key to establish them within its do
main, and thence comes the name,
Turkish bath. 1T should be borne in
mind that the Turkish bath is hot air
bath, while the so-called Russian bath
is steam bath, and the two are totally
unlike in their effects. The former is
essentially tonic in it's effects, while
the latter, like the hot water bath, is
enervating.
Very few people comprehend why
the hot air bath is so potent in the cure
of disease. The reason is simple, and
readily understood. Natures method
of protecting the body from the effects
of heat, especially high temperatures.
is by the evaporation of moisture from
the surface of the body, and this moist
ure is provided by the perspira,ion, and
the less clothing the more etfectual the
results, SO that natives of hot climates
who are nearly naked realize more fully
The benefits of perspiration.
Upon submitting ones body, Invested
of clothing, to the $50 degrees and up
wards, of heat, demand comes for re-
lief; soon the pores are opened, per-
:haps to an extent not before realized
for months or even years, as many per-
sons have inactive skins, and when this
is the case other organs, and notably
the kidneys, must take on double duty,
and are thus overtaXed and diseased.
So now the pores are actively at work
and the poisonous wornout material
is being eliminated from the body
through natures sewerage system
the pores. What follows as a sequence?
Why, as the blood furnishes the per-
spriation, it necessarily comes to the
surface, and thus the circulation is
equalized over the entire surface, and
as the logical sequence of this all con-
gestive tendency is relieved, thus es-
tablishing perfect equilibrium, which
is absolutely essential to perfect
health The bath thus becomes
health preservative.
AS it is expensive, and often incon-
venient, to resort to the public bath, or
thermae, an excellent substitute is TO
be had in the use of the so-called bath
cabinet, which incloses the individual,
except the head, the heat being fur
nished by an alcohol lamp. Much high
er temperature and better results can
be obtained in houses where furnaces
are used by placing the cabinet over
the furnace register and shutting off
the heat from some of the other regis
tiers. There is no doubt whatever that
the grippe may be avoided, as we'll as
cured, by use of this simple and mex
pensive method, which every one can
have. I assert further that the con-
gestive condition of pneumonia can be
readily relieved by this method This
is no mere theory, for l have known
of its successful application in the last
crisis of pneumonia, not once, but sew
eral times, with both children and
adults. The medical domain of the
bath is limitless, and for the reason
that it places the entire organism in
condition to relieve itself of disease to
an extent impossible by any other
means. l have known of the worst
cases of continent smallpox cured and
not a peck mark left on the skin. 1t
has been proved beyond all peradven-
ture cure for hydrophobia within my
own personal knowledge.-Dr. L. 2.
Haskell, in Hinsdale Beacon.