er is seldom in condition for an operation, is run down, the
vitality is low-- that is why the muscles over the intestines have
weakened and spread.

Another grave danger lies in the fact that a very large opening must be
made-- many delicate tissues cut through-- before the surgeon can reach
the weakened muscles which caused the rupture.

Moreover, in a surgical operation, the relaxed muscles are tightened
simply by shortening them-- by cutting out a piece.

But nothing is done to strengthen these muscles. Nature is in no way
assisted. The parts usually remain weak-- that is why, when a man leaves
the hospital after an operation for rupture, he is usually told to wear
a truss or support.

And that is why, in about six out of every ten apparently successful
operations, the rupture sooner or later breaks out anew.

So we would never advise an operation, save as a last resort. As in
strangulated hernia, where there is no hope except through heroic
measures.

Save in very rare cases, there is now no need whatever to undergo the
dangers of an operation-- no need to risk the surgeon's knife. No need
to incur the big expense of going to a hospital-- no need to lose any
time from work or business-- no need to be in bed a single day.

For since the invention of the Cluthe Truss or Cluthe Automatic
Massager, the day of operation is over, save for an occasional case.

The Cluthe Truss has probably effected more _permanent_ cures than all
the operations ever performed.

And is always _safe_, and almost invariably _beneficial_, whether or not
it brings complete cure. (Cure is sometimes impossible, as told in
another chapter.)

_+Why Ordinary Trusses Do More Harm Than Good+_

The country is full of trusses which are nothing but more or less
worthless makeshifts. Some with so little merit that they try to hide
under other names.

Like the junk handed out at drug-stores. Like the traps peddled by the
quacks who pose as Hernia "Specialists."

Trusses and appliances with belts, bands or springs around the waist,
trusses with leg-straps, etc.

Some of these trusses cost little more to make than a pair of good
suspenders or garters. A little leather, a few pieces of elastic or web
band, a cloth-covered pad with sawdust in it, is about all there is to
them.

So, like suspenders or garters, they absorb perspiration; that rots them
so they soon give out.

But their greatest weakness isn't in their cheap materials