Pearl.—Take our advice and see a doctor at once. Severe headache is a very common symptom, and though it is usually caused by some trivial ailment, it is often the only subjective sign of a serious disease. Your attacks suggest megraine, but they might be due to far more serious things. Without a complete personal examination no man living could diagnose your malady.
Fox.—What size corsets do you wear? Tight lacing is, or rather was, a very common cause of fatness about the face. What age are you? It is very common for women to get double chins and extra plump cheeks when they have passed their thirtieth year. Very many diseases cause fatness of the face. Kidney disease is one of the commonest of these. All we can advise you to do is to be careful about your diet. Avoid farinaceous puddings and sweets. Take plenty of exercise. No drug is of much good in obesity of any kind. Some of the mineral waters, especially Vichy, are sometimes useful to stout persons.
A Weary and Careworn Girl.—We are exceedingly sorry that we could not answer your letter earlier. The troubles that you have gone through are enough to depress any girl of twice your age. We think that all your sufferings are due to nervousness resulting from being "run down." What the impediment in your speech is, is not quite clear from your letter. Probably it is far less than you imagine, else your mother would certainly have noticed it. The difficulty which you find in commencing to talk is due to nervousness. As your health improves, and as you grow older this will tend to disappear. We will publish an article on blushing and nervousness next month. To the last of your questions your clergyman would be more competent to give you an answer than ever we could be. Go to your pastor and tell him your troubles. He is sure to be able to comfort you in your affliction and to help you to bear your cross with patience for the sake of Him who laid down His life for you.
Croyden.—The habit of taking acids to cure indigestion is greatly to be deprecated. Acids and bitters are very useful in some forms of indigestion, but they should never be taken unless ordered by a physician. Alkalis, such as bicarbonate of soda, are on the other hand of great value in the majority of cases of indigestion. Indeed we will go further than this: we have never met with a case of indigestion from any cause which was not benefited, sometimes only temporarily, by alkalis. We have seen very few cases of indigestion which have been relieved by acids. Our candid opinion is that the habit of taking acids and bitters to cure disorders of the stomach or loss of appetite, is a very fertile cause of the life-long indigestion so common nowadays.
Black Eyes.—In an answer to "Fair Isobel," which was published some months ago, the treatment of blackheads was thoroughly discussed.
Emily Phelps.—Your glasses do not suit you. Go to an oculist and get his prescription for another pair. Your symptoms are very common in people who use unsuitable spectacles.
Buttercup.—Bunions are due to the pressure of badly-fitting boots. In the human foot the great or innermost toe bends away from the other toes. This gives to the inner border of the foot a direction slanting inwards towards the middle line of the body. Most boots are made with their inner border slanting outwards away from the middle line so as to meet the outer border of the boots at a more or less acute angle. We have therefore the great toe naturally tending to depart from its fellows, and we have the boot forcing the great toe towards, and possibly under or over, the other toes. The boot is an unyielding structure. The inner border of the foot is also practically unyielding, except at one spot, the joint of the great toe. The first toe is therefore forced inwards and its joint projects as an angle. The boot presses upon this joint, a corn forms, inflammation is set up, and the joint becomes diseased, forming a bunion. When once a bunion has developed, it is no good talking about its prevention. We must attempt to cure it, and it is not so very difficult to cure it, and keep it cured, if you fully understand how it originated. A bunion is caused by pressure upon the joint. The cure of the bunion consists of removing the pressure from the joint. To do this you should wear boots in which the inner border slopes away from the centre of the boot. We advise you to get a pair of boots of this shape made for yourself. If the bunion is intractable, you may need a "post" in the boot between the great and the second toe. Keep your foot scrupulously clean, and take a foot-bath every evening.
J. S. N.—As your mother died from heart disease, it is no wonder that you imagine your own symptoms to be likewise due to heart trouble; but the symptoms you mention are all characteristic of simple dyspepsia; not one of them is common in heart disease. When you say "at times my pulse beats very fast and sometimes irregularly," we presume that you mean that you feel your heart beating fast or irregularly, in other words, that you have palpitation. When the heart is beating fast or irregularly, as it frequently does in heart disease, it produces no symptoms which might inform the sufferer of her state. It is only by feeling the pulse that irregularities in its action can be detected. We will not say that heart disease is not hereditary, but the importance of this factor has been greatly over-estimated. Disease of the heart is very frequently due to rheumatic fever; and the tendency to rheumatism is; to a certain extent, hereditary. You will find plenty of information about indigestion in our last year's volume.
Esther.—We can well understand that you feel a little nervous about your chest, when you tell us that both your parents died of phthisis. You know that the risk of your developing the disease is considerable, yet it by no means follows that you will get phthisis. By no means are you certain to get phthisis. You must be very careful about yourself, and the least bit of a cough or cold which may attack you must be carefully attended to. Indeed we advise you to call in your family doctor the moment that you have any cough or other untoward symptom. Certainly you would do well to spend your winters in Switzerland.