erited, had become
pretty well riveted on a constitution already but poorly prepared to
endure it.

In her seventeenth year, she was afflicted with a troublesome eruption,
which was cured, or at least checked, by a wash of sugar of lead. (See
Chapter XIII.) She was married at twenty-one; and though stinted in her
growth, so as to be almost a dwarf, she seemed, at first, to be
tolerably healthy. But in the course of a year she suffered from various
complaints, to which scrofulous and otherwise debilitated females are
subject in early conjugal life, for which she was treated--as I suppose
very injudiciously--with active medicine, especially calomel.

And now, as if to render what was already bad enough a great deal worse,
she made use of a certain patent medicine, which had been greatly lauded
in the public papers. She was also persuaded to make use of a more
stimulating diet than before; which was doubtless to her great
disadvantage, in such a feeble condition. Her diet, though it should
have been _nourishing,_ should have been _less stimulating_ than usual,
and not more so.

Falling in with the famous Sylvester Graham, who was lecturing near her
at the time, she was overpersuaded to change her habits very suddenly,
especially her dietetic habits. From a highly seasoned diet, she was at
once transferred to a very plain one, to which was added cold bathing
and abundant exercise in the open air. This change, though it caused
great emaciation, appeared to restore her health entirely. Her appetite
and general strength were such that she thought it almost impossible she
could ever be sick again.

But now a heavy domestic affliction befell her, which again very much
reduced her; and, as she was wont to say afterward, "killed her." What
it was, however, I was never informed. Being greatly depressed, she
undoubtedly confined herself to the house too much, and in one instance
when she ventured out, she unluckily exposed herself to a damp east
wind, which appeared to give her cold. To remove this, and for other
purposes, she fasted rigidly, for several days.

It was at this time that she came, in part, under my care. But she was
already so much diseased in mind and body, and so ignorant of any just
principles of hygiene, as to be greatly liable to be led about by the
fancy or whim of this friend or that--sometimes by Mr. Graham and
others, who only relied on Nature; and at others, by those who went to
the opposite extreme. I