NERVOUS PROSTRATION AND A VENERABLE COUSIN.
I once heard a woman say that she had lived half a lifetime before she
realized that the commandments were written for her. In a vague sort of
way she had appropriated, “Thou shalt not steal,” “Thou shalt not bear
false witness;” but she did not intend to do these things--the
commandments must be for those who did. Her dumb amazement may be imagined
on hearing a venerable and saintly soul state that she was so grateful to
God that in her long life she had had no temptation to be a Magdalen. It
was unthinkable that she should have had.
But the stress of life grew to agony; disappointments and wrongs heaped
upon my friend; and one day she stood bare-souled and alone before God,
confronting the commandment: “_Thou_ shalt not kill!” In her struggle back
to the Divine she learned that all of the commandments were written for
her. Ever since, her heart has been pierced with tenderest sympathy for
every man or woman who has fallen before temptation, and the despair of
the suicide seems her own.
Unvarying good health and steady nerves were my inheritance, and my
husband’s fine, calm judgment helped to increase my nervous vigor. I am
afraid I had once a quiet disdain for nervous women, and was supercilious
towards what I deemed a lack of moral fiber, believing that with it health
conditions would not have become “all at loose ends.” But a time came when
I too was going from sofa to easy chair, and dropping back into bed limp
and trembling; when the banging of a door or the rustling of a paper “set
me wild;” when I was being a means of grace to all my family through
giving them an opportunity to “let patience have its perfect work”--and
all with no justifying cause, except that the iron of sorrow had entered
my soul, the color had been taken from my life, and I had not yet found my
readjustments. Nevertheless I denied my condition, and so one day the
doctor tried to explain it to me. “A person,” he began, “is said to be
nervous when presenting a special susceptibility to pain, or exhibiting an
undue mobility of the nervous system, as when one starts, or shakes on the
occasion of abrupt or intense sensorial impressions, thus showing an
exalted emotional susceptibility. The heart itself under the influence of
nervous stimulation may in a moment change its customary order and rate of
action, and in extreme cases cease to beat. The whole mental processes, as
well as the functions of organic life, may be seriously involved. Now in
your case, madam----”
“Stop, doctor. I take in the fact,” said I, “which is evident in your
high-sounding phrases, that nervous prostration is a killing complaint and
you are going to treat me for it.”
“Perhaps so,” said the doctor. “It often happens that an exaltation or
diminution of activity in some one portion of the nervous system causes
perverted action in another part, as when any unusual strain has been
thrown upon you.”
“For instance,” said I, “when a friend came last Sunday and allowed me to
carry up-stairs her grip-sack with books in it?”
“Politeness should never require you to do such a thing,” said the doctor,
“but the strain may not be any physical exertion or overwork; deficient
sleep, any sudden shock of joy or fear, especially terror, might prove
fatal.”
“I was much frightened last summer,” said I, “by a stroke of lightning
which destroyed an immense oak tree in front of the door. It was a worse
panic than that which seizes one on seeing one’s husband bringing three
gentlemen to dinner, when there is only one good little porter-house steak
in the house.”
“Allow me to say,” continued the doctor, “nervousness characterizes women
more than men. It sometimes comes on as a sequence of severe illness, some
grave anxiety, some physical or moral shock, like the unexpected discovery
of perfidy or disloyalty on the part of a friend. Then, too, nervous
prostration is brought on by unremitting or monotonous duties, which keep
the same paths of action from day to day.”
“I was told,” said I, “of a lawyer who entering his office the other day
read upon his slate the statement that he would be back in half an hour;
in a fit of absence of mind he took a seat and waited for himself, and it
was some time before he realized that he was in his own office, and that
he was not one of his own clients.”
“That,” replied the doctor, “was no worse than the case of the reverend
gentleman who on going out one morning gathered up an ordinary business
coat and carried it around the whole day, thinking it was his overcoat,
and was more surprised than anybody else when informed of his mistake.
These examples are evidences and symptoms of nervous disorder. I never
knew a man to hurt himself by mere bodily labor; but excessive mental toil
is certainly capable of damaging the nervous tissues. Any calamity,
misfortune, pecuniary loss, or accident is liable to bring on nervous
prostration. What are the symptoms? Loss of sleeping power, incapacity and
aversion to work, lassitude, headache, an anxious and cross expression of
countenance, heart disturbance, cramp--all these may be indications of
local nervous exhaustion.”
“Doctor, how do you propose to exterminate this formidable enemy?”
“For the treatment of nervous diseases,” said he, “we have at our disposal
invaluable remedies whose action is more or less special. There is
strychnine, bromide of potassium, possessing the opposite properties of
increasing and diminishing the reflex excitability of the nervous system,
in addition to other beneficial modes of action. Then we have chloral and
morphine, acting directly and indirectly as hypnotics, thus allowing the
curative action of rest to come into play. For pain, we have opium, Indian
hemp, subcutaneous injections of morphia, and the galvanic current. We
have any number of drugs for influencing, relaxing, mitigating pain,
reinforcing the nutrition of wasted muscles. Then there are nervine
tonics, preparations of zinc, arsenic, iron, quinine, phosphorus,
cod-liver oil, to say nothing of cold or tepid douches, and the massage
treatment.”
“Good gracious!” I exclaimed, “am I to swallow all these poisonous
things?”
“There is no occasion for alarm, madam. I don’t propose to prescribe all
these things at once. The first thing I shall order is very important--it
is a simple but nutritious diet. Eat plenty of ripe fruit; drink pure,
distilled water; take plenty of gentle but regular exercise, and sleep as
much as possible. You must be surrounded by agreeable society, have plenty
of fresh air and excellent food, and with temperance, avoiding all
excitement and mental exertion, I hope you will soon be well.”
“But, doctor, suppose baby Laura falls down-stairs or the house takes
fire?”
“You are to be kept ignorant of all such things. The medicine you need is
perfect rest, for after all it is the most powerful therapeutic agent when
you understand its nature and the indications for its use. You rest your
body in sleep, you rest your mind by looking on beautiful things, hearing
good music, and thinking of nothing. Sleep is a preventive of disease, and
the want of it, if carried too far, causes death. Sleep is balm to the
careworn mind and over-wrought brain. In these days of emulation and
worry, the waste of nerve force must be repaired by sleeping and cessation
from all work. Now is the time to stop, lest you come to the door of the
insane asylum. I repeat, absolute rest,” said the doctor, striking his
cane on the floor, “and no stimulants to excite rapid circulation. The
brain recovers slowly and resents too early demands on it after any
injury. The general health must be maintained at the highest possible
standard, and you must not worry. You must be a philosopher.”
“Doctor,” said I, “I can do better than that; I can be a Christian. I can
say, ‘Yes, Lord,’ to whatever God sends. That is the philosophy of Hannah
Whitall Smith, and I have tested its efficacy.”
“Yes, madam, I too,” said the doctor, “would recommend anything of a
soothing, tranquilizing character. I shall call to-morrow; good morning.”
I have reflected somewhat since those days, and when a woman tells me now
that she is suffering from nervous prostration I know that she is
struggling with a disease--a mournful, painful, destructive actuality.
Emerson says, “when one is ill something the devil’s the matter.” I know
it is so with a woman, for all the peace and joy of life go out of her
with sickness. I believe, too, that she would be subject to less nervous
prostration if she had greater part in the more enlarging and ennobling
human activities. But as mother earth reinvigorated him who touched her,
so what life we have comes from God, and indwelling with the Divine ought
to renew us body and soul. Christ Himself may not have revealed the
miracle of health to the apostles, but He taught them to use it. Mankind
soon lost connection with the spiritual dynamo of revitalization--except
most intermittingly. But has this been so through necessity or by reason
of gross materialism? Among “the greater things than these” of the
promise, may not highly spiritualized natures already be refinding the
natural laws of healthful living through emphasizing the rightful
dominance of man’s spiritual being? “All my fresh springs are in Thee!” “I
will arise in newness of life” cannot refer to the soul without including
the body, for the greater includes the less. The tendency to give less and
less medicine; the declaration of the medical world that drugs are not
curative; the healing of the body by the invisible forces of nature, as is
being done every day--all these things electrify with the hope that the
world is about to discover “the miracles in which we are nourished.” The
revelation of the 20th century may be how to pull out that “nail of pain”
which, according to Plato, fastens the mind to the body; and the joy of
simple, harmonious existence may become a reasonable hope to suffering
mortals.
After this experience of illness I made a trip through Canada and the
East. With new vigor and the old interest I resumed my home duties and was
preparing to enjoy our New Orleans carnival season, when one morning the
housemaid announced: “Mis’ Cal_line_, I do b’lieve Rex is come, fur dar’s
er ole man at de do’ wid er shabby umbril an’ de _ole-es’_ han’bag--an’ he
say he’s you’ cousin!” I hastened to meet him, and knew at once who it
was; but the old man was in an exhausted condition. He said: “I have some
brandy with me, and I need it. I have been very sick, but I thought I was
well enough to come to see you once more before I die.” I administered a
stimulant to old cousin Jimmie, and in a cheerful strain he continued:
“Oh, you’re so like your ma, cousin. She was an angel, and your
worldly-minded old pa gave her lots of trouble, for your ma was pious, and
she had a hard time to get him into the church. Cousin David was a fine
man, too, and he had to give in at last to the blessed persuasion of
cousin Betsey, your angel-mother.”
The next day I observed cousin Jimmie was holding a wooden whistle in his
hand, and blowing softly into it. I inquired what it was. “This whistle,”
he said, “is older than your old spinning-wheel and the ancient chiny in
the corner cupboard.” “But, I enquired, what is the use of it?” Cousin
Jimmie replied: “They called up the crows with it, so they could shoot
’em.” “I always regarded crows as harmless creatures whose inky blackness
of color was very useful as a comparison,” I replied. “Well, you never
knowed anything at all about crows,” said cousin Jimmie. “I tell you, when
a crow lights on a year o’ corn, they eats every single grain before they
stop; and I tell you they are suspicious critters, too--these crows! I
used to thread a horsehair into a needle and stick it in a grain o’ corn,
and draw the hair through, and tie it, and throw it around, and they would
pick it up and swallow the corn. Then I would stand off and watch the
rascals scratchin’ their beaks tryin’ to get rid o’ the hair, until they
got so bothered they would quit that field and never come back. I was a
little boy, them days.” “Yes,” said I, “and boys are so cruel.” “Maybe
so,” said cousin Jimmie; “but I wa’n’t ’lowed to have a gun to shoot
’em--crows nor nuthin’ else. Boys was boys them days, not undersized men
struttin’ ’round with a cigyar in their mouths, too grand to lay holt of a
plow handle. Why, some big boys, sixteen years old, can’t ketch a horse
and saddle him, let alone put him to a buggy all right. I know that for a
fact!”
“Do you like roast lamb and green peas, cousin Jimmie?--for that is what
we have for dinner to-day; but I can order anything else you like better?”
“I’m not hard to please, cousin,” he answered. “I like good fat
mutton--and turnips; but cousin, them turnips must be biled good and
_done_. _Done_ turnips never hurt nobody. Why, when I had the pneumony
last winter I sent and got a bagful--and I had ’em cooked all right; and
way in the night, whilst I had a fever, I would retch out and get a turnip
and eat it. Bile ’em good and done and they can’t hurt nobody--_sick_ or
well.”
“I never heard of sick people eating turnips,” said I.
“But you see I have, and has eat ’em, and am here to tell you about ’em.”
“General Grant is nominated for President,” said I, looking over the
morning paper. “Grant, did you say? I’ll never vote for him! He wasn’t
satisfied with $25,000 for salary, but wanted $50,000; and nex’ time he’ll
want a hundred thousand. Do you know, cousin,” said the old man, “that
them Yankees robbed me of one hundred and fifty niggers? The government
ought to pay me for ’em. They had no more right to take them niggers than
they had to steal my horses and mules--which they stole at the same time.
I tell you, they must _pay_ me for my property!” and cousin Jimmie came
down with a heavy blow of his walking cane on the rug. “Ef they don’t pay
me they are the grandest set o’ villyuns on top o’ earth! When the
blue-coated raskils was goin’ up the Cheneyville road they met up with two
runaways old Mr. Ironton had caught and hobbled with a chain. A Yankee
said it was a shame for a human bein’ to be treated so. Mrs. Ironton flung
back at ’em: ‘I don’t care! you may show them to the President himself,
and hang them round his neck, if you like.’ The old woman was so sassy
that the man simmered down. I heard another officer inquire very perlite,
ef it was customary to sarve the niggers this way, and I said we had to do
something to keep ’em down in their places; and, no matter how bad a
nigger was, he was too valuable to kill, so we punished ’em in other ways.
“To-morrow is my birthday,” sighed cousin Jimmie, “and I’ll be
eighty-eight years old.” I celebrated the day for him and made him some
presents; and I asked him to tell me bravely and truly whether or not he
would be willing to live his life over, to accumulate all the money and
estate he once possessed, to become a second time sick and old and
destitute. Cousin Jimmie was silent a moment; then his aged eyes twinkled,
and a smile spread over his still handsome old face: “I would try it over;
life is mighty sweet; I’m not ready to give it up, cousin.” “But you must
before long relinquish all there is in this life.” “Well,” said he, “I’ve
made pervision. I gave my niece Mary all my silver and my red satin
furniture, and my brother has promised to bury me with my people in
Mississippi. I’m all right there.”
“I’ve heard, cousin Jimmie, that you denied the globular shape of the
earth. How is that?”
“Why, I _know_ the earth is flat. ’Tain’t fashionable to say so, but it
don’t stand to reason that the world is round and flyin’ in the air, like
folks say. ’Tain’t no sech thing--else eyes ain’t no account.”
Two years more of this life, and then old cousin Jimmie--who was my
father’s first cousin on his mother’s side--was able from some other
planet, we hope, to investigate the shape of this one to which he had
clung so loyally.