horseback-the Bath affords the most astonishing relief. Having performed long journeys on horseback, even to the extent of ninety-four hours, without taking rest, I know by experience its effects in the extremest cases. A Tartar, having an hour to rest, prefers a bath to sleep. He enters as if drugged with opium, and leaves it his senses cleared, and his strength restored as much as if he had slept for several hours."-Reprint from "Pillars of Hercules," p. 43.

"Never was there a greater mistake made than to consider the Bath weakening," says Dr. Le Gay Brereton. "If you go into the Bath weary and jaded, even though you have been up and working all night, you come out refreshed; if from grief and care you are desponding when you enter, your heart is lightened before you leave, for it is impossible to resist the exhilarating effects of oxygen: if, on the other hand, from the reaction of over-excitement, you are restless and unable to sleep, the Bath becomes a narcotic. It is only the experienced physician who knows how many forms of disease originate in these so common, but now so easily obviated causes.' -Action and Uses of the Turkish Bath, p. 6.

Mr. Urquhart in the reprint we have quoted says of the common porters of Constantinople-"You will see a Hummal (porter), a man living only on rice, go out of one of those baths, where he has been pouring with that perspiration which we think must prostrate and weaken, and take up his load of five hundred weight, placing it unaided on his back." Von Tempsky in his Travels says that the habitual use of the bath had exercised similar invigorating influences over the Catarina Indians, endowing them with great strength and powers of endurance:

"The Catarina Indians are described as the most famous throughout Guatemala for carrying the heaviest burdens on their backs over the worst roads, for the longest distances, and in the shortest time; their products are all carried thus to the market of Guatemala.

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'They generally go in bands of thirty or forty, Indian file, dog's trot, with the chief at their head, and each with his long staff, their support and their commonest weapon.

"Each with nearly two hundred pounds weight on his back, supported by straps round the forehead, shoulders, and waist, bending forward, they go thirty miles a-day without fatigue, and in good time; and no rider has any chance with them in the steep parts of the road.”—Ante, p. 151.

It is thus a peculiar attribute of the Bath that it is equally applicable in health and disease-beneficial alike to all constitutions, and so far from the judicious use of the Bath having any tendency to weaken the constitution, or exercise a depressing influence in disease, it possesses a cleansing and replenishing, a strengthening and invigorating influence, incomparably superior to any medical agent that has yet been discovered. How could the Bath possibly weaken and depress the vital organism, when experience has demonstrated that, in depressing and weakening disease, it acts as a powerful and safe stimulant—a stimulant beyond comparison-superior in safety and salutary effects to any the whole range of pharmacy can supply? Its influence is rarely, if ever, that of a depressing relaxant, but invariably that of an invigorating tonic in all cases to which it is properly applicable. This is the conclusion arrived at by the most eminent medical authorities of the day who have studied and tested its action, and he cannot be a competently qualified practitioner who is content to remain in ignorance of so invaluable an agent, that possesses such undoubted and powerful Prophylactic and Therapuetic properties.

CHAPTER XVIII.

In Abnormal conditions of the Heart, or predispositions thereto, the influence of the Bath most salutary—Opinions of scientific and practical authorities thereon-The action of the Bath in affections of the Head, Throat, Chest, and Lungs, or in predispositions thereto-Authorities quoted.

BESIDES the objections already noticed that have been unreasonably urged against the use of the Hot-air Bath, there are others which we are aware intimidate many from availing themselves of its sanitary and sanative virtues. Unfortunately, when medical practitioners are consulted, there is, as yet, only an enlightened minority really competent to remove groundless apprehensions and advise with confidence the employment of a remedial agency so powerful and salutary; while even among / those who are convinced of its general utility as a therapeutic, there are some who still entertain lingering doubts, respecting its safe applicability in some forms of disease, or predispositions to disease. It is experience alone that can effectually remove such doubts, and the conscientious anxieties to which they naturally give rise. Already a large amount of decisive information has been acquired by experience, and it is gratifying to know that as the investigations of enlightened members of the profession have become more extended, their experience more enlarged and matured, so have apprehensions of danger vanished, and their confidence in the beneficent action of the Bath has been increased and confirmed.

In all heart affections, or predispositions thereunto, it was at first generally supposed that the use of the Bath would be attended with great danger. There are still many who, in all

human probability, would receive great benefit from its soothing influence even in actual disease, yet are deterred from making the trial through vague fears that injurious consequences might possibly follow. Dr. Edgar Sheppard, who has studied the subject closely, says "The alarm of those who have actually organic disease of the heart, or, at all events, an hereditary tendency thereto, is natural, and such as to excite our sympathy. There is an unmistakable dread of the hot-air Bath under these circumstances, arising from a fear of undue stimulation of the circulatory system. But it is remarkable that the very contrary effect is produced in these unfortunate cases—the bath tranquilises and subdues."- Bathing, &c., p. 21. Erasmus Wilson, says "I am not to be told that because the remedy stimulates the heart, it is not to be used. Every remedy that produces perspiration stimulates the heart, and it is one of the virtues of the hot-air bath that it does stimulate the heart. Nor am I prepared to admit that in cases of disease of the heart, the therma would be inapplicable. I believe just the contrary-that many diseases of the heart may be cured by the judicious use of the thermæ, and in the very worst cases it would prove to be the best remedy that could be employed."-British Medical Journal, October 13, 1860.

An increased activity in the circulatory power does not necessarily imply an increased virulence of whatever form of disease the heart may be affected with. The belief that it does, was, and to a large extent still is, the prevailing doctrine in medical schools, which it must be confessed are, for the most part, but gloomy abodes of superannuated dogma, into which the rays of experimental truth very slowly penetrates. In the Manual of the Bath, edited by Sir John Fife, M.D., "whose practical experience of the bath," says Dr. Sheppard, "has probably been greater than that of any other man in England"it is stated that, "in the Bath, persons suffering from disease of the heart obtain instant relief, although the number of the pulsations is increased. It is just as in the case of a steamengine going down an inclined plane, the piston works more

rapidly because the work is done for it. The skin comes to the aid of the heart and lungs."

Dr. Goolden, who, as we have observed, made the bath a special study before reporting in favour of its establishment in connection with St. Thomas's Hospital, London, was quite astonished at its soothing action on the heart. "What struck me," he says, "as most remarkable, was the influence of the hot room in quieting the circulation in some cases of palpitation of the heart." Dr. Barter in one of his lectures in the Rotundo, Dublin, explains this-"When the pores, veins, and arteries were obstructed, was not the heart, upon those obstructions being removed, allowed to act more gently? Was it not an old proverb in the profession that the skin was the safety-valve to the heart?" See The New Irish Bath, &c., p. 50. Dr. Balbirnie remarks that "in purely nervous irritations of the heart, or in those connected with organic disease-in simple palpitations, in angina pectoris-the hot room actually does quiet the circulation."-The Sweating Cure, p. 35.

The house surgeon of the Newcastle-on-Tyne Infirmary, in which the Bath has been employed with the happiest effects for the last eight years, says: "As far as I have observed, the extreme heat exerts less influence on the heart and circulation than the ordinary warm bath; (and in order to bear out this assertion, I may state that some cases, in which the pulse and stethoscope gave unmistakable evidence of heart disease, such patients have undergone the process without attendant mischief, and with most unlooked-for benefit."

Dr. Thudichum, who is a very high authority, relates the following:-"A case of dropsy from heart disease, with a pulse of 170, almost moribund, has come under my notice. The patient was kept in the Bath one day and one night, afterwards at intervals; within a week his pulse had become slow, averaging 75, and the patient was able to walk about the garden. Two cases of palpitation of the heart, unaccompanied by valvular disease, have come under my observation, in which a low temperature of the bath mitigated the palpitation, but a higher