IT’S GONE, ALL GONE, AND I’M GOING TOO.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 7062, 7 February 1893, Page 4

IT’S GONE, ALL GONE, AND I’M GOING TOO.

For many a year did the game man sweep a certain street-crossing in the Hampstead. Through all seasons and all weathers, there he was, sweeping the crossing and taking such gratuities as were given him. Time wore away, and he came to be 80 years old. Hb appeared at his post no more. A lady district visitor looked him up at his lodgings. 'What a picture of squalid destitution. Ho fire, no food, no friends. Wife and family he had not—never had. The poor old fellow was perishing of starvation, of want. Some money was raised for his benefit and he was removed to a London Hospital. Here be lay several weeks sinking daily. One night he was clearly very low. Hear him stood one of the hospital physicians and a nurse. Seeing him clutch nervously at his pillow, the nurse, supposing the patient to be raised up, pat bis arm beneath him to perform that service. In doing so the nurse’s hand came in contact with an object which he withdrew./ It was a ditty little canvas bag tied with a leather string. As it was laid aside the old man perceived what had been done, lifted his skeleton frame partially from the bed and, trembling with excitement, said in a shrill whisper. "Ah my treasure, my treasure ! It’s gone, all gone, and I'm going too 1” and sank baok dead. The bag contained £SOO in notes—the savings of his miserly life. And he, there, dead of starvation, even more than of age. Well, what of it P you say. The wretched old man was better dead than alive. Quite so, but most human events have a moral, a lesson, about them, if we keep an eye out for it. What, for example, can we learn from the following facts ?—One night about ten years ago a man whose name we can furnish went to bed as usual, apparently in good health and spirits. A few hours later ho lay unconscious on the floor. In explanation he stated that be had been seised, suddenly, with a pain of such violence that be was compelled to rise, —a pain in the chest. After rising he lost hia senses and sank down on the spot where ho had stood His wife aroused by the noise struck a light and saw her husband in that situation, bhe afterwards declared he had gone black in the face, and that his eyes looked as if they were starting out of his head. Bostoratives were applied, which brought him to, but he was not as before. So quickly and unexpectedly do we cross the boundary line between two opposite bodily conditions. It is like stepping from the broad blase of ] day into a damp cavern, packed with darkness. He felt weak and sick, with a strange “ all gone” sensation throughout the whole system. His mouth tasted badly, and was filled withe slimy sort of phlegm, bis head ached, and he was unable to take a deep breath, he walked with difficulty, and went about his business like a man who is haunted by a paralysing dream. i Perplexed and alarmed he consulted physicians, who prescribed for him, without, however, producing auy noticeable improvement. The strong, clear headed man of previous years was gone—changed as if by the hand of a vicious magician into the feeble being he now was. liven with this dismal prospect before him our friend travelled not on level ground ; his path led downward j he grew worse. In December, 1888, he had a distinct and bad attack, gave up business, and went to bed. There he remained for a weary painful month—thirty days, as long as thirty years of power and occupation. The doctor said there was something wrong with the stomach and bowels. After he once more rose from his bed he still suffered dreadful pain and could rest □either day nor night. Indeed, some nights be never slept a moment. So weak had be become that when he attempted a short walk he was obliged to abandon the effort, return and go to bed. His own words are these: —" To give you an idea how reduced I had become _ I may mention that 1 lost over three stone weight and was wasting away. I kept on like this until January, 1891, when Mr Bveraon, of Oocold, told me of a medicine called Mother 1 Syrup and the good it had done. I tried it and in three days I felt better. Cheered and encouraged by this I continued to use it, with the result that I wholly recovered from my mysterious malady. I am now strong and hearty, and business is again a pleasure. The Syrup did me more good in a few weeks than all the ten years doctoring put together.” (Signed) Albert ‘ Thorndyke, Proprietor of the “Grapes Inn,” Church Street, ®ye, Suffolk. May Ist, 1891, What do we learn from this ? We learn that while a miserly fool like our crossingsweeper may starve for money, a wise man with more reverence for hia bodily temple, seeks and finds a remedy for a tendency to starvation , induced by disease ;—that the disease was indigestion and dyspepsia, and the remedy Mother Seigel’s Syrup.