d and perverted during the time of Its natural
activity, the greater is the disturbance occasioned when it ceases.

TREATMENT. There should be regularity in all the habits of life. Women
are too apt to approach this important period without due care and
consideration. When the physical system is about to suspend a function,
it is folly to endeavor to perform the labor or assume the
responsibilities which were permissible when the constitution was more
robust.

How the duties of each day and hour weigh upon the energies of the
mother! What intense solicitude and yearning she experiences! How
unselfish is that mother who each day works steadily and faithfully for
others, and who is conscious of the hidden dangers that lurk around her
pathway! With confiding faith and love, she commends the interests of
her children to Him who doeth all things well. She anticipates the wants
of her family and strives to supply the desired comforts, thus wasting
her strength in the labors prompted by her loving nature. Would it not
be a greater comfort to those children to have the counsel of their dear
mother in later years, than to have the bitter reflection that she
sacrificed her health and life for their gratification?

Unconsciously, perhaps, but none the less certainly, do women enter upon
this period regardless of the care they ought to bestow upon themselves.
Without sufficient forethought or an understanding of the functional
changes taking place, they over-tax their strength, until, by continuous
exertion, they break down under those labors which, to persons of their
age, are excessive and injurious. Is it strange, when woman has thus
exhausted her energies, when her body trembles with fatigue and her mind
is agitated with responsibilities, that the menses capriciously return,
or the uterus is unable to withstand congestion, and capillary
hemorrhage becomes excessive? If the physical system had not been thus
exhausted, it would have exercised its powers for the conservation of
health and strength. It is better to be forewarned of the ills to which
we are liable, and fortify ourselves against them, rather than squander
the strength intended for personal preservation. Let every woman, and
especially every _mother_, consider her situation and properly prepare
for that grand climacteric, which so materially influences her future
health and life.

The general health should be carefully preserved by those exercises
which will equal