The Winslow mail., 1899-06-15
THE FRIGHT CURE.
One of the Queer Remedies for Ner-
vous Diseases.
Some Daring Methods of Treating
Serious AGections-Cutting the
Hair to Cure the
Headache.

It is characteristic of the end of the
century that it has not only given birth
to new diseases, but has invented many
startling cures for old ones.
1t has been observed that rheumatic
and nervous patients who have been in
any severe accident, or have received
any violent shock, have begun to re-
cover from the very moment of the
shock, and this observation suggested
to one eminent specialist the idea of
curing by fright.
His methods of producing the shock
vary with the different cases, but IA
vorite plan is to send anonymous let
ters to his patients full of virulent
abuse or threats of injury. The fear
and indignation thus caused rouse the
patients as nothing else could. They
forget their ailments, and thus take a
very important step towards a cure.
Another physician claims to have
made some remarkable cures by his
aystem of ''frigopathic," or freezing,
in obdurate cases of nervous exhaus-
ton, consumption and dyspepsia.
The process consists in subjecting
the patient to a more than arctic tenn
peraturc. For this purpose he has de-
signed freezing bath, a tank of metal
lined with furs, five feet deep and Az
square. This tank is inserted in
an outer well, the intervening space
being filled with a freezing mixture
of carbonic and sulphurous acids, which
keeps the temperature of the well from
100 degrees to ITO degrees below freez-
ing point.
The patient is lowered into this arc
tic temperature and kept there from
ten minutes to a quarter of an hour,
the process being repeated at inter
walls of few days.
The effect of the freezing is said to
be almost magical. The dyspeptic SUBJ
iect, who for years, possibly, has never
known the luxury of a good appetite,
emerges from his bath ravenous with
hunger, and the nervous subject finds
his nerves strengthened and his whole
body filled with new life and energy.
The most chronic cases yield to a treat
ment of month or two.
Of all human ailments, rheumatism
can boast the most varied and startling
remedies. In Malta the rheumatic pa
tient invites bees to settle on and
sting him, the poison of the sting neu-
tralizing the acids of rheumatism and
allaying, if not actually curing it.
In Australia still more remarkable
remedy is in fashion. The patient fre-
quents hotel in the neighborhood of
the whaling grounds When a whale
is caught and towed ashore, little pits
or graves are dug in his carcass, and in
these beds of decomposing blubber the
patient lies for all hour or two, re-
peating the process as long as the whale
or his rheumatism lasts.
Another daring method of treating
rheumatism is to make the patient
walk barefooted on dewy grass every
morning and evening; while a more
agreeable cure as that of sun-bathing,
in which the victim spends certain
time each day basking or exercising in
the sun in state familiar to Adam.
One of the latest and most effective
methods of curing cold is the homeo-
pathic one of applying ice to the spinal
column, striking variation from the
more ordinary plan of roasting your
cold' before a hot fire.
A successful method of relieving bad
Or chronic headache is to cut the pa
TENTS hair. BY cutting the ends of
the hair so many thousand natural
vents are opened to relieve the conges-
tion in the head.-Cincinnat Enquirer.