XII.—Is going into the Cold Bath in a State of Perspiration attended with Danger?
“The transition from a Vapour-bath to snow, or to a Cold-bath, has been practised by the Russians for time immemorial” with the most beneficial results,—“this,” adds Dr. Johnson, “is conclusive, that there is no danger whatever in going into the Cold-bath while covered with perspiration; unless it can be proved that perspiration produced by hot vapour is a very different thing from perspiration produced by a blanket;” and, adds the learned doctor, in his valuable work on Hydropathy, which every one ought to read; “All physiological reasoning goes to prove, that it is safer to go into cold water when the temperature of the skin has been raised.
“If there be danger at all, it is going into cold water without raising the temperature of the body. It must be the temperature that is the question; for it cannot be of consequence whether the body be covered with grease called perspiration or hog’s-lard. Re-action will most certainly be produced, and congestion as certainly prevented by going into the water when the body is warm. Profuse perspiration does not make the body hotter, in proportion to its profuseness, on the contrary, it is cooler than before, for perspiration is a cooling process.
“When perspiration is present, the body is never extremely hot. Checking perspiration is a chimerical danger; the oozing of perspiration subsides of itself, almost at the moment the means that produced it are withdrawn, and the perspiration on the body is that which has been already produced, having now no connection with the body.”
At Cork in Ireland, it was told me by one of the first brewers, that formerly his men, while in a state of perspiration, from pressing the grain out of the vats, frequently caught cold and died: at last they adopted the plan of going into cold water, whilst in that state; the result of which has been that they now never catch cold from their occupation, and are as healthy as other people.