The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-02-24

offended. She IS fifteen and has an idea
that she is tool old 10 run. 1t would do
her more good than a dozen electric treat
ments. But electricity has dignity and
importance-and sounds Well. Poor Bet
tie. She will come around 10 my way af-
ter awhile,
did you know that no doctor who is
gentle and tolerant and considerate is
ever very successful with women? Its an
actual fact. Think of the famous special
lists you've met or heard OF. 1t wouldn't
be polite or professional for me TO recall
their htue idiosyncrasies to you. but is
there an exception? The gentle, sympa-
thetic family physician is all right when
the children have the measles or you
have a bad throat or the head OF the fam
lily has a cold and wants 10 make his will.
But when it is case of delicate surgery,
Of hysterical mania, or any OF che un.
lovely phases of neurasthenia. lovely wo-
man needs an iron hand and an appar-
emily merciless disciplinarian. Curiously
enough, she does not flee from him. She
pretends great rebellion, but she trusts
him. The ones who humor and indulge
her are ores she is suspicious OF. Oh,
nerves arc a beautiful speciality!
The nerve-healer made an enemy of a
pretty young widow once upon a time.
early In his career. The widow was
esting seclusion. She rather enjoyed
being met on ferrybcats when on her
way to the cemetery by jolly, unbereav-
ed friends, and she chung to her sorrow
gracefully and tenaciously. AS she had
been married to a man cd enough to
be her father, who was reputed to be
wealthy and died comparatively poor, the
widows physician was inclined to be I'M
sympathetic and incredulous when the
NV EaFI l.
not sleep or eat, and found everything
but weeping an effort.
Don't tell such things to the men you
known" said the brutal young Saw
bones. For you know some fine fellows,
and every man of sense has a horror OF
a hysterical wife. Why a hysterical
home is worse than a lunatic asylum, for
the latter is a well-organized and compar-
atively peaceful place. A hysterical wo-
man is nothing more or less than luna
tic of a peculiarly unpleasant kind,
worse than a common lunatic in that she
cannot be shut up in an asylum. The
cunning of hysteria is proverbial, and
many hysterical women are such charm
ing creatures to look at that the world
often does not suspect anything am'ss.
The members of their families suffer just
the same Grieving for fun, weeping
for nothing, eating starch and potato
SKINS, drinking vinegar ana Otherwise
manifesting symptoms of a hysterical
state of mind are not matters to boast
of or laugh at. They are danger-signals,
as truly as are the shifty eye and the
stumbling gait of the lunatic''
The little widow did not rush off in a
rage She listened and swept out like
a tragedy queen when he had finished.
He had advised her to doff her long veil.
1t was lnjuring her health and eyesight.
He had recommended long walks and
early hours and lots of occupation, even
If she had to be so indecorous as to go
into society to get it. But she was
grievously offended and remained so for
years. In the meantime she did not
marry one of the fine fellows who had
"a horror of hysterical wives" Five years
after her old husband was laid to rest she
onsented-without any tears or outward
tremors-to marry the brutal doctor!