TEN MONTHS’ SUFFERING IN A HOSPITAL.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2068, 5 July 1890, Page 3

TEN MONTHS’ SUFFERING IN A HOSPITAL.

There is an old saying that physicians are a dais of men who pour drugs, of which they know little, into bodies of which they know less. This it both true and untrue at the same time. There are good and poor lawyers, and good and poor doctors. The trouble with these medical gentlemen as a profession is that they are clannish, and apt to be conceited. They don’t like to be beaten at their own trade by outsiders who have never studied medicine. They ttjerpfofe pay, by thfir frequent failures, the penalty of refrying instruction unless the teacher bears their own “Hall Mark.’ 1

Anjeminent physician—Dr. Brown-Sequard of Paris—states the fact accurately when he says : “ The medical profession are so bound up in their lelf-oonfidenoe and congest that they allow the diamond trpths of seienee to be picked up by pprsgqs entirely outside their ranks.We give a most interesting incident, which illustrates this import ,nt truth The steamship “ Ooncorida,” of the Donaldson Line, tailed from Glasgow for Baltimore in 1887, having on board as a fireman a man named Richard Wcie, of Glasgow. Ho had been a fireman for fourteen ypars on yerious ships sailing to Anqerigq, Obina, and India. He had tiornp the hard cpd exhausting labour, and had been healthy and strong, On the ship we uqw name he began for the first time to feel weak and ill. His appetite failed and he suffered from drowsiness, heartburn a bad t' Me in the mouth, and oostiveness and irregularity of the b - wel \ Sometimes wh^ o at work he had attacks of giddiness, £ufc supposed it to be omsed Ijy bVafc of the fire-room. Quite offcou ho swi siek and felt like and had *ome pain in the head during the passage he grew worse, and when the ship reached Halifax ho war placed i Q _ victoria General Hospit,l, end the shin Sailed away without him, The house •urgeon gave him some powder* to atop the vomiting, and thq day the visiting physician gaye him a, mixture' to take every fops Within two days was so much worse that the doctor* stopped both the powders and mixture. A month passed the pool fireman getting worse and worse. Then came another doctor, who was to be visiting physician for the next five months. He gave other medicines, hut not much relief. Nearly all that time Wade suffered great torture , he digested nothing, throwing up all he ate. There was terrible pain ia the bowels, burning heat in the throat, heartburn, and racking headache. The patient w; i now taking a mixture every four hours, powders one after each meal to digest the to d, operating pills one every night, and temperature pill* two each night to stop the cold sweat i. If dings could cure him at all, Richard ha i an idea that he took enough to do it. But on the other hand pleurisy set in and the doctors took ninety ounces of matter from his right side, and then told him he was sure to die. Five month* more rolled by, and there aco'.ber change of visiting pbyiioians The new one gave Wade a mixture which h e said made him tremble like a leaf on a tree l

At this stage Wade’s Scotch blood asserted itself. He refused to stand any more dosing, a'd told the doctors if he must die he could die as well without them as with them. By this time a cup of milk would turn sour on his stomach, and lie there for days. Our friend from Glasgow was like a wreck on a shoal, fast going to pieces, We will let him tell the rest of his experience in the words in which he communicated it to the press.

He says: “ When I was in this state a lady whom I had never seen came to the hospital and talked , with me. She proved to be an angel of mercy, for without her I should not now be alive. She told me of a medicine called * Mother Seigel’s Curative Syrup,’ and brought me a bottle next day; I strrted with it, without consulting the doctors, and fa only a few days’ lime I was out of bed calling for ham and eggs for breakfast. From that time, keeping on with Mother Seigel’s great remedy, I got well fast, and was soon able te leave the hospital and come home to Glasgow. I now feel as if X was in another world, and have no illness of eny kind.”

The above facts are calmly and impartially stated, and the rerder may draw hia own conelusion. We derm it best to use no names, although Mr Wade gave them in hie original deposition. His address is No. ?44, Stoborois Street. Glasgow, where letters will reach him. Editor.