the same
manner. They should not be taken except under medical advice.

2452. Vapour Bath at Home.

Another equally easy but far more effectual method of procuring a
vapour bath at home is to attach one end of a piece of gutta-percha
tubing to the snout of a kettle on the fire, and to introduce the
other end below the chair, on which the person who requires the bath
is sitting, enveloped in a blanket as described above.

2453. Hot Water.

In bruises, hot water is the most efficacious, both by means of
insertion and fomentation, in removing pain, and totally preventing
discoloration and stiffness. It has the same effect after a blow. It
should be applied as quickly as possible, and as hot as it can be
borne. The efficacy of hot water in preventing the ill effects of
fatigue is too well-known to require notice.

2454. Thinning the Blood.

It is desirable to consider the means of thinning the blood, when it
has been deprived, by too profuse transpiration in hot, dry winds, of
its aqueous particles, and rendered thick and viscid. Water would
easily supply this want of fluidity if it were capable of mingling
with the blood when in this state; acid matter cannot be ultimately
combined with the blood when the body is in this state. In order to
find a menstruum by which water may be rendered capable of combining
ultimately with the blood, of remaining long in combination with it,
and of thinning it, we must mix it with a substance possessing the
property of a soap, and consequently fit to dissolve viscous matters,
and make them unite with water.

The soap must contain but little salt, that it may not increase the
thirst of the parched throat. It must not have a disagreeable taste,
that it may be possible to drink a considerable quantity of it: and it
must be capable of recruiting the strength without overloading the
stomach.

Now all these qualities are to be found in the yolk of egg. No
beverage, therefore, is more suitable (whilst it is very agreeable)
for hot, dry weather than one composed of the yolk of an egg beaten up
with a little sugar according to taste, and mixed with a quart of cool
spring or filtered water, half a glass of Moselle or any other Rhenish
wine, and some lemon juice. The wine, however, may be omitted, and
only the lemon juice be used; in like manner, hartshorn shavings
boiled in water may be substituted for the yolk o