ged every
feeling of benevolence; in the latter I ought to have proposed my
objections in full, and not to have compromised so as to submit to what
I really believed to be radically and essentially wrong.

For I did most fully believe all this; and in spite of every effort at
concealment, my scepticism finally came out, and I was weak enough to
speak of it, and openly to find fault with Dr. Bolus. A practical
quarrel followed between Dr. Bolus and myself, in which the friends
joined, or, at least, strongly sympathized.

My own belief, then, was, and it still remains the same, that the
violence of the young man's disease, especially the tendency to the
brain, was chiefly, if not wholly, owing to the medicine administered;
and that, from the very first, no active medicine--nothing but an
exceedingly mild and cooling treatment--was required. It was even my
belief that the ulcer was caused by the medicine.

But, while I lost confidence in human nature, and especially in the
human nature of some of my brethren of the medical profession, by this
experiment, I became more thoroughly convinced than ever before of the
great need of honest and benevolent as well as scientific men in this
department, and of the general impotency and worse than impotency of
much that is dignified with the name of medical treatment. I became most
fully convinced, that in acute diseases as well as chronic, Nature,
unembarrassed, will generally accomplish her own work, when left to
herself and to good and careful nursing and attendance.

CHAPTER LXXVII.

BLEEDING AND BLISTERING OMITTED.

One of my neighbors had fallen down-stairs, and injured himself
internally, in the right side of the chest; and a degree, greater or
less, of inflammation had followed. The pain was constant, though not
severe; but the soreness was considerable, and did not give promise of
speedy amendment.

My advice was to keep quiet, both in body and mind, and to avoid all
kinds of exertion that could possibly affect the chest. I also advised
the use of water, not only for drink, in small draughts, but, if the
pain and soreness should be troublesome, as an external application to
the part affected. The food was to be mild and unstimulating. A tendency
to crowd around the fire was to be guarded against and prevented, by
putting on, if necessary, an increased amount of clothing.

Two days passed away with no great variation of the symptoms, either for
better or wors