the door, to
put in a window which opens, or an Arnott's ventilator, or to cleanse
and lime-wash the cottages? Of these things the benefits are sure. The
benefits of the inexperienced administration of medicines are by no
means so sure.
Homoeopathy has introduced one essential amelioration in the practice of
physic by amateur females; for its rules are excellent, its physicking
comparatively harmless--the "globule" is the one grain of folly which
appears to be necessary to make any good thing acceptable. Let then
women, if they will give medicine, give homoeopathic medicine. It won't
do any harm.
An almost universal error among women is the supposition that everybody
_must_ have the bowels opened once in every twenty-four hours, or must
fly immediately to aperients. The reverse is the conclusion of
experience.
This is a doctor's subject, and I will not enter more into it; but will
simply repeat, do not go on taking or giving to your children your
abominable "courses of aperients," without calling in the doctor.
It is very seldom indeed, that by choosing your diet, you cannot
regulate your own bowels; and every woman may watch herself to know what
kind of diet will do this; I have known deficiency of meat produce
constipation, quite as often as deficiency of vegetables; baker's bread
much oftener than either. Home made brown bread will oftener cure it
than anything else.
APPENDIX.
[Transcriber's note: These tables have been transposed to fit the page
width.
The figures in the left hand column, Table B: Nurse (not Domestic
Servant) do not add up. There is probably a typographical error in this
column since it cannot be accounted for by errors in transcription.]
TABLE A.
GREAT BRITAIN.
AGES.
NURSES. Nurse (not Domestic Nurse (Domestic
Servant) Servant)
All Ages. 25,466 39,139
Under 5 years ... ...
5- ... 508
10- ... 7,259
15- ... 10,355
20- 624 6,537
25- 817 4,174
30- 1,118 2,495
35- 1,359 1,681
40- 2,223 1,468
45- 2,748 1,206
50- 3,982 1,196
55- 3,456 833
60- 3,825
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