Later and wiser investigation has proved it to be so much controlled by climate that it may be practically located on a chart of the globe, if all the climatic conditions are fully known. Of course, it is not absolutely confined to any given limit, more than is the yellow fever, which sometimes makes its appearance as high as the forty-second degree of latitude, while its actual home, so to speak, is, on this continent, below the thirty-fifth parallel.
In a medical chart of this country, which we had occasion to examine many years since, the district where consumption attained its maximum range was outlined along the coast, beginning with the State of Maine, having a semi-circular sweep to Fortress Monroe in Virginia, with an inland limit varying from one to two hundred miles. This is well known, now, to all the medical profession, to be the territory where phthisis pulmonalis has greatest sweep, and this is conceded to be, for the most part, caused by the marked peculiarities of climate existing over all this area. These peculiarities have, in some of the immediately preceding chapters, been duly though briefly set forth, and we now proceed to the consideration of the sanitary value of the Minnesota air and its effects on lung diseases as experienced by sufferers and observed by others, together with some of its leading characteristics.
If it has been sufficiently shown that the temperature of the district in which consumption prevails most is a highly variable one, passing almost daily from a low to a high point in the thermometric scale, with the prevailing winds to be those in which east largely enters; and that these winds come laden with a cold moisture, borne from off the surface of the North Atlantic, which, when exposed to their sweep, chill the person and pave the way to colds, catarrhs, rheumatism, pneumonia, and a score of other ills scarcely less harassing and destructive, and all of which give rise to the "great destroyer," as it has been sometimes called. If, as we have said, these points have been proved to be the leading ear-marks of this special locality, what, we may ask, are the characteristics, briefly stated, of the climate of the State, which is known to be comparatively free from, and, in very many instances, to have wrought for the sufferer a complete restoration of health and strength? They have been seen to be almost the exact antipodes of that of the consumptive district before named. Instead of the northeast wind, there is the northwest, or at least the prevailing winds from some point into which west enters; bringing, in place of the cold, humid atmosphere of the North Atlantic, the dry continental winds from the interior, which, in conjunction with the high altitude and peculiar geographical position of the State, give, instead of the extreme variable temperature, an equable and a relatively dry atmosphere, having a bracing, tonic effect on the whole man, affording opportunity for unrestrained exercise in the open air, causing good digestion to wait on appetite, and with these the advent of fresh wholesome blood, which is the physician to heal the diseased portions of the lungs, and restore healthful action to all of the inflamed parts.
In confirmation of the high value of this State as a residence for invalids of the class to which special reference is made, we extract from the last census report the following statistics, showing the average number of deaths from consumption in the following States to be
One in 254 in Massachusetts,
One in 473 in New York,
One in 757 in Virginia,
One in 1139 in Minnesota.
This speaks for the climate more of praise than it is possible for any scientific speculation to do, since it is the practical and final test as well as the most satisfactory.
Undoubtedly, the relative disproportion would be very much greater if the number of deaths of those who go from other States, after it is too late for them to receive any benefit, could be eliminated from the actual number that die from among the inhabitants themselves. The question may arise right here among some of the more skeptical, how it is that any of the population are afflicted with this disease, if the climate is such an enemy to it? We answer—that full half of the deaths reported from phthisis are of those who come too late—as before stated—and a fourth of the whole number we know to be from among those who are not natives, but yet are of the regular inhabitants, whose lives have been prolonged here, and who from improper exposure or neglect of wholesome rules (which they at first rigidly followed, but growing better, neglected to maintain), have paid the penalty. Not over one-third of the entire list of inhabitants of the State, up to the present time, are natives; hence deaths from consumption among the remaining two-thirds cannot be attributed, by any fair inference, to the direct influence of the climate. This still leaves a fourth of the whole number of deaths from this scourge to fall on those who "are to the manner born." This is a very trifling percentage, and might be waived as not being a fraction sufficiently important to merit much attention; but we may frankly admit that these cases appear here, and are the result of a want of a perfect equability in the climate, and to this extent it must be held answerable. We might, however, conclude that even this final fraction could be accounted for in the hereditary taint, but we forbear, as we likewise do to claim entire exemption here from this complaint. No climate, perhaps, in any portion of the whole habitable earth, could be found to be utterly exempt. Then, too, consumption is to general debility a natural sequence, almost as much as flame is to powder when exploded; and as there are likely in all climates, however favorable, to be found worn-out and exhausted humanity, why, there must be expected untimely deaths culminating in this disease.
The curability of consumption is now a settled question. Every medical student has either seen for himself or been assured by his professor that post mortem examinations have disclosed this truth beyond all cavil. Numerous cases might be cited where, at an early period in life, tubercles had formed, and by-and-by, probably in consequence of a change in the habits of life, these disappeared, leaving naught but old cicatrices as evidence of their previous diseased condition. These tubercular deposits must have disposed of themselves in one of three ways: first, they might soften down and be expectorated; second, they might soften and be absorbed; or, thirdly, they might become calcined and remain as inert foreign material. In many cases all these processes might unite in the removal, and a long life follow, as is well known in some instances to be true.
An eminent instance in point occurs to us as we write, and which is worthy of citation in these pages. The lamented Rev. Jeremiah Day, once President of Yale College, when a young man, had "consumption," and was expected to die, but by a rigid observance of the laws of health, and self-imposition of stated exercise of a vigorous nature in the open air, he, by these means and without much of travel, restored his debilitated frame and healed the diseased lungs, and died at the rare age of ninety-five, having lived a life of uncommon usefulness and activity. He could not have accomplished his restoration without many and daily sacrifices compared with the lot of his fellow-men. A post mortem showed plainly that both apices of the lungs had been diseased.
There are many cases, of which no knowledge exists outside of a small circle, of restored health, though with impaired power of respiration and consequent endurance of great hardships, which latter, of course, must be entirely avoided by those thus situated. There is, too, even greater liability to a fresh attack than with persons who have never been afflicted, but the vigilance necessary to maintain health fortifies against its repetition.