125. RUBBING SHEET, SUBSTITUTE FOR THE HALF-BATH.
It cannot be difficult to procure a wash-tub. Should you be so situated, however, as not to be able to procure even this, you will be compelled to make shift with a rubbing sheet. For that purpose, a sheet and a pail of water are all you need. The sheet is wetted in the pail and slightly wrung out. The patient steps on a piece of oil-cloth or carpet, and you throw your wet-sheet over him and rub, as before indicated. When the sheet is warm, you dip it in the pail again, and repeat the process, and thus you go on, till the patient is sufficiently cooled.
If you can have two pails of water, it will be better than one, as the water becomes warm after having changed the sheet a couple of times.
126. WHERE THERE IS A WILL, THERE IS A WAY!
I have been frequently compelled to resort to these milder applications, when there were no bathing utensils in families or boarding-houses, or no servants to carry the water for a bath; and they have always answered very well. In cases where a sitz-bath or a half-bath is indispensable, to save the life of a patient, you will find the means of procuring bathing utensils and the necessary quantity of water.
Where there is a will, there is a way!—I am sure that when once your mind is made up to use the treatment, it will not be difficult for you to find the means for it. There is always water, and there are always hands enough, where there is resolution. And who would mind a little trouble, when he can save a fellow creature's, perhaps a darling child's life and health? As for the rest, the few days' trouble, which the hydriatic mode of treatment gives, is largely recompensed by the much shorter duration of the disease, and by the immediate relief the patient derives from almost every application of water.
I have generally found that those parents who had confidence in the treatment, had also the courage to resort to it. Confidence and courage create resolution, and when once you have begun to treat your patient, you will be sure to persevere. Il n'y a que le premier pas qui coûte, as the French say: only the first step is difficult.