for it, but I tried it anyhow. The result was surprising. I
believed I had thrown up my immortal soul.

Now, as I am giving my experience only for the benefit of those who are
troubled with the distemper I am writing about, I feel that they will see
the propriety of my cautioning them against following such portions of it
as proved inefficient with me, and acting upon this conviction, I warn
them against warm salt-water. It may be a good enough remedy, but I
think it is too severe. If I had another cold in the head, and there
were no course left me but to take either an earthquake or a quart of
warm saltwater, I would take my chances on the earthquake.

After the storm which had been raging in my stomach had subsided, and no
more good Samaritans happening along, I went on borrowing handkerchiefs
again and blowing them to atoms, as had been my custom in the early
stages of my cold, until I came across a lady who had just arrived from
over the plains, and who said she had lived in a part of the country
where doctors were scarce, and had from necessity acquired considerable
skill in the treatment of simple "family complaints." I knew she must
have had much experience, for she appeared to be a hundred and fifty
years old.

She mixed a decoction composed of molasses, aquafortis, turpentine, and
various other drugs, and instructed me to take a wine-glass full of it
every fifteen minutes. I never took but one dose; that was enough; it
robbed me of all moral principle, and awoke every unworthy impulse of my
nature. Under its malign influence my brain conceived miracles of
meanness, but my hands were too feeble to execute them; at that time, had
it not been that my strength had surrendered to a succession of assaults
from infallible remedies for my cold, I am satisfied that I would have
tried to rob the graveyard. Like most other people, I often feel mean,
and act accordingly; but until I took that medicine I had never reveled
in such supernatural depravity, and felt proud of it. At the end of two
days I was ready to go to doctoring again. I took a few more unfailing
remedies, and finally drove my cold from my head to my lungs.

I got to coughing incessantly, and my voice fell below zero; I conversed
in a thundering bass, two octaves below my natural tone; I could only
compass my regular nightly repose by coughing myself down to a state of
utter exhaustion, and then the moment I began to talk in my sleep, my
discord