III. RIGHT AND WRONG DIET FOR NERVOUS PEOPLE

People who are the offspring of nervous parents and who have had a nervous breakdown should not eat commercial sugar, eggs, or animal food of any kind whatever. These statements may seem wholly unimportant to some people, but I realize what a tremendous bomb I throw into the camps of others when they read them. You see, for centuries people have believed meat and eggs to be the best of all foods; so when I make a statement like the foregoing, the effect is not unlike that which followed Columbus' statement that no matter what people believed, the fact was that the earth was round, not flat. From the very beginning it has not made a single bit of difference as to what physicians or anybody else thought; facts count. And no matter what we may think or how long we have thought it, facts go right on being facts just the same.

Sometimes, even after twenty years' experience, about once in two or three months—because there is nothing else at hand—I find myself eating a small bit of meat. This usually happens when I am on a lecture tour. But if I eat only a small slice of bacon at the evening meal I dream bad dreams and the next morning feel drowsy, heavy, and sluggish. Animal foods as well as eggs and commercial sugar poison all those born of nervous parents. I have proved the truth of this by my own case and by several years' observation of other cases.

Do your children have "night terrors"? You answer, yes. Well, let me tell you how to stop these horrors in the little ones. If you give them meat—and remember you should never give them pork—let them have a very small piece at noon, never at night. And they should never be permitted to have it for breakfast. Give the child his one small bit of meat at noon. For the evening meal give him some cereal with milk or cream, but no sugar. Give him all he wants of this special dish, but nothing else at that meal, and you will find his "night terrors" and moaning will cease.

I look back on most of the nights of my childhood with horror, for until I became a man I talked in my sleep and had the most horrible dreams. I used also to get up in my sleep and walk about the room. My parents were well aware of the fact that all of their eight children were poor sleepers, and of them all I was by far the worst. And, although it was innocently done, the food they were giving us was poisoning us. You don't need to think that in order to take poison you must have strychnine or arsenic. No, indeed you don't. We were fed exactly as hundreds and thousands of poor little ones are being fed now as this is being written. We were fed on meat, eggs, and fats, and when we became ill, friends round about us thought they were doing something real kind when they sent in a nice piece of fried rabbit or some celebrated golden brown fried chicken. But we vomited at the sight of the food—which was really our salvation.

I have two boys of my own. The elder, a sturdy chap not yet ten years of age, has to have clothes for a fourteen-year-old boy, and he is much stronger than any boy of his age he has ever met. The younger boy is now seven and his physical development is wonderful for a child of that age. Now these boys hardly know what an egg is. They never eat one. As to meat, I am certain that since they were born they have not eaten it on an average of once a week. They have eaten a little, but you will admit that eating meat not more than once a week, and often going weeks without a bit of it, certainly is eating very little. There have been times when they have not seen meat for three months.

Now, I don't eat as I do and have my children eat as they do just for a fad. I think nothing is more stupid and silly than for people to do certain things just because somebody else does them. We should all have good sound reasons for our actions in this world. We should all try our very best to use sound common sense. That's why I say that people who are the offspring of nervous parents should not eat animal food of any kind after they are twenty-one, and they should never at any time eat eggs. It would be far better for them if they did not eat commercial sugar. But I do admit that when some of these people get well by dieting, they are able to eat sparingly of all these things and still keep well. But some people can never eat them and I am one of the number.

I remember one summer about two years ago I was on a lecture tour for a Chautauqua Bureau, and it seemed that surely I got into the very worst eating places that summer that I ever had in my life. For three or four days I ate only eggs, as they seemed to be about the only food I could get besides bread and butter. At the end of the third day—I remember the time very well—when night came I could not sleep, and just as when I had one of my nervous breakdowns, that old feeling of inexpressible gloom began to settle over me. I knew instantly the cause of it, because twice before when I had purposely experimented with eating eggs I had had similar experiences. I immediately took a heavy cathartic and after having thoroughly rid myself of the poison I again slept well.

But I am not alone in this fight against the use of eggs for nervous people. John Burroughs said that eggs poisoned him, and I have talked with men of great wealth and great business ability who have reached the top by their own efforts, who have told me that eggs poisoned them.

Now I have found that for these nervous people animal food is a slow poison. Sooner or later it will do its work.

And just here I wish to say that there are some people who seemingly can eat almost anything and not suffer from so doing. Last summer I talked with Count Ilya Tolstoy, son of Leo Tolstoy, the celebrated Russian writer. The Count, who is also a lecturer, told me that he was obliged to have eggs and that he had eaten them all his life. He said his appetite was never satisfied unless he ate eggs. He is now past sixty, and apparently is strong and rugged. Now eggs no doubt are good for him. But right here is where infinite harm can be done to nervous people like myself. People who can eat everything—and among physicians seemingly there are many who can do so—will say to these poor sufferers:

"Why, it's all nonsense about things hurting you! Eat anything you want and all you want and then forget about it."

Physicians have said that to me and during the past twenty years I have heard them say it thousands of times to others.

Personally I do not believe in Christian Science—physicians of the Regular school do not believe in it; but do you know that when a physician says to a sufferer from "nerves," "It's all nonsense about what you eat hurting you; eat anything you want and then forget about it," that physician is fully endorsing Christian Science. He is telling the person to whom he is talking that there is no such thing as physical suffering. Of course, such a physician is nothing but a fool. Yet that's why so many of these people turn to Christian Science. Yes, that is exactly why they try it. It bolsters up a sufferer for a time just as contact with a magnetic and hopeful personality may for a time bolster one up. But such persons almost always go back to the sanitariums. "Nerves" is not a mental disease; that is, the seat of the trouble is not mental but physical, and the mental phase of "nerves" is only a symptom, or rather one of the symptoms of the disease.

We people who have gone down into the dark valley have experienced a million, more or less, different kinds of feelings. I fully believe one half of the American people are the offspring of nervous parents. This means that there are fifty-five million of this nervous type of Americans. This type includes people all the way from the man in an office who gets angry quickly, to the individual who is in a state of complete collapse. And the man who is afflicted with nothing more than a quick temper, or is living under high nervous tension, is liable to beget children who will suffer from the malady in a far worse degree than ever he will, unless, indeed, he eats only the things he should eat and observes a number of other rules besides the two I have already laid down.

Now, the ideal diet for nervous people is a slightly modified vegetarian diet. To be specific, it is a Lacto-vegetarian diet minus eggs. There are, however, two things included in this diet that I would warn one in the beginning to eat of sparingly. These are bananas and cooked cabbage. If they agree with you, well and good; but if they do not, let them strictly alone.

Eat all kinds of vegetables, both fresh and cooked. Eat all kinds of fruits, especially fresh fruits. There is an old saying and a good one, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away."

There are a thousand ways to prepare vegetables and fruits for the table, and there are a number of books that give good recipes. If a nervous individual has never yet had a breakdown I believe he can safely eat most of the vegetarian dishes that have eggs in them, but it would be a serious mistake to select the special dishes that contain eggs and live on those just because they contain eggs.

I believe, too, that after a nervous person is restored to health, if he strictly observes the rules of eating sparingly and of chewing all food to a cream, he may safely try out such courses as are found in Bardsley's Recipes for Food Reformers or Broadbent's Forty Vegetarian Dinners.

It may seem odd, but there are people who for some reason or other lack the instinct, or whatever is needed, to know that a certain thing they eat hurts them. I have had men and women sit in my office and say with the utmost sincerity that they were certain that it wasn't anything they ate that hurt them because they never had any pain in the abdomen. Sometimes these people were in a dreadful state of nervous breakdown. So you see the danger that lies here. If you know, you can always tell what special thing disagrees with you. For example, I know eggs disagree with me, and like John Burroughs and many others, I know when they harm me. Therefore, after you have recovered you might try being your own physician. But if you are not sure as to what disagrees with you, you would much better stick to a vegetarian diet and go without eggs the remainder of your days.

Commercial sugar also is the cause of many breakdowns among the people of this country. And is it not strange how these poor suffering people crave sweets—the very thing they should not have. They will argue with themselves—and some physicians will agree with them—that they should go right on eating candy because they want it. But, as I have already said, there is just as much sense in saying a man should have whiskey because he craves it or that a young man should have tobacco because he craves it, as to say that any one should have candy because he craves it. There is absolutely no sense in such an argument. If you are suffering from a nervous breakdown, for sixty days quit eating candy and everything sweet except honey, and follow the other rules I have already laid down. It may be that you will have to stick to this diet for three months. But try it. That is exactly what cured all my bodily ills and brought my soul out of the dark and gloomy night after everything else had failed. I do not mean to say that this diet alone cured me, but I do say it was the biggest factor in the cure. There are, however, some other things that it would be worse than folly to ignore. This I shall come to later. But just here I want to have it understood that this thing of eating—how you eat, and how much you eat, and what you eat—is of transcendent importance in the cure.

Of course, under some circumstances connected with cases of breakdown, nothing but the good judgment of friends will avail. For example, the question of how much one shall eat is something that not all the books in the world nor all the physicians in the world can determine. I say, always quit while you want a little more. I cannot say more or less than that.

So many have written me recently asking just what I eat, that it may be a help to some of them if I set down here just what I ate today. I ate no breakfast at all. Sometimes I go for weeks without eating breakfast. This is especially apt to be the case if I am engaged in writing a magazine article or a book. I find my brain is much clearer and that I can work much better when I eat no breakfast. But I do drink one or two cups of very weak tea. I use just enough tea to color the water. Now I do not advise everybody to go without breakfast. Some people tell me that they have a headache unless they eat something. And some writers say that if they do not eat a little breakfast they cannot write so well. Thus you see where the question of common sense and using your own judgment comes in. There are always a few things you will have to decide for yourselves. At noon I ate about two handfuls of corn flakes with milk and cream but no sugar, finishing with about four ounces of bread pudding that had a little brown sugar in it. Now, in mid-afternoon, as I write this, I am not hungry. Tonight I shall eat another dish of corn flakes and some buttered toast and three or perhaps four good-sized apples, I usually eat three or four apples a day. If I want a piece of pie for lunch, I eat it, but I eat nothing else.

I live on the plainest of plain foods. Apples used to create a lot of gas in my stomach, but now they do not because I chew them to a cream. Milk used to make me constipated, but it does not when I chew the cereal with it carefully and eat a number of apples.

Most nervous people are constipated. But apples are really the salvation of nervous people. If you are constipated, drink, or rather, sip, a glass of hot water half an hour before breakfast, then eat nothing for breakfast but apples; eat two big ones and chew them slowly to a cream. Go to stool regularly every morning. This habit is half the cure of constipation.

Apples, of all things I know, are the finest things for the liver. If you take a patient ill from chronic indigestion, whose stools are clay colored, and put him on a diet of apples, if he chews properly, in less than twenty-four hours the stools will be of the regulation dark brown color, as they should be when the liver is working in a normal, healthful manner. And eating apples will work in exactly the same way with children as with adults.

Apples, apples, apples! Eat them no matter what the price. You remember how good Adam found the apple—or at least we presume it was an apple that he found so good—and I can think of no other single thing that would tempt a man to make all the trouble he did. If he had to sin, then I'm for Adam every time, for I think had I been in his place and Eve had offered me a big juicy red apple, I should have taken it and eaten it. I don't know but that I might even have eaten it without the invitation. I think that Adam's great mistake was not so much in eating the apple as in trying to lay the blame on the woman. Nobody should ever apologize for having eaten an apple.

Now, generally speaking, there is one thing a nervous parent—or any other kind of parent for that matter—should never say to a child. Never tell him he is nervous. If we realize that our children are the offspring of nervous parents, it is, as I have already suggested, much better for all concerned, for we cannot avoid a danger unless we know what or where the danger is. When we know the child is nervous we should plan carefully, leaving out of his diet all pastries and rich greasy foods, and keep him largely on a vegetarian diet. But, as I have already suggested, we do not need to diet a nervous child as strictly as we do a nervous adult where infinite harm has already been done. Give the nervous child meat only a part of the time, and if he goes without eggs it will be all the better for him. I wish from the bottom of my heart that I had never tasted an egg!

What a fine thing it would be if we so trained our children that they would never suffer from "nerves"! And usually it could be done. The belief that because nervous parents have broken down their children sooner or later must break down, is our greatest curse. But such a belief is absurd, for if dieting, outdoor exercise, and a few other simple rules are observed, there is no danger that it will happen. To be sure, these rules must be definitely understood and strictly adhered to.

If we treat this misfortune in the manner I shall mention later, we can make our lives more successful and infinitely happier than the lives of those who have never learned self-control. For instance, I am far healthier than men all around me who seem to be able to eat three Christmas dinners each day. They sit at the table and boast about being "good feeders," then later they come to me for pills, saying, "There is nothing the matter with me, doctor, but I thought I had better take a little medicine so I won't get ill." But they don't fool me. I know exactly what is the matter with them. They are so full of pork they can't think. To tell the truth, we people who have suffered from a nervous breakdown or some illness akin to it, and have learned that we must eat right or die, are of all people the most fortunate.

Every now and then I hear some good old sister, with a face like a full moon and jowls like a bloodhound, say, as she finishes her third piece of mince pie,—her waist line having extended accordingly,—"Isn't it too bad about poor brother Jones! He looks so terribly thin! They say he has fallen away from one hundred and sixty pounds to only a hundred and fifty. And they do say he can't eat meat and eggs at all! The poor man!"

But the real facts of the case are that brother Jones is able to walk ten miles any day, and the possibility is that in the not distant future he will read in his morning paper that sister Sue Portly has been operated on for gall stones and the number reported is almost unbelievable, about three hundred, in fact. And so, all the time sister Portly was feeling sorry for lithe, energetic brother Jones, she was a walking stone quarry, as it were, and yet didn't know it.

So don't worry because you have to diet or because after reading these lines you determine that you must begin to diet. For, whoever you are, and wherever you may be, you belong to a most fortunate class of people.

And now I wish to say some things about what nervous people should do besides dieting, and especially do I wish to say these things to those now suffering from a nervous breakdown. Much of it at least will apply to children of nervous parentage. You will observe as you go along that I keep mentioning "these children." I do so always with the thought in mind that there is absolutely no need for them ever to break down if these common sense rules are followed. I take it that not any one of us or a number of us, but that all of us love our children more than we love ourselves. Admitting the truth of this, then we should all be interested in this system for them as well as for ourselves, for as their nerves are so shall their success be.

IV. VALUE OF OUTDOOR LIFE AND EXERCISE

People in this country are now beginning to get away from the idea that a man or woman who is past sixty is getting "old." When the Rev. John Wesley, the itinerant preacher and author, was eighty-eight years old—please note the eighty-eight—he walked six miles to keep a preaching appointment. When asked if the walk tired him, he laughed and said: "Why, no! Not at all! The only difference I can see in my endurance now and when I was twenty is that I cannot run quite so fast."

I know there are calamity-howlers who say: "Oh, well, some people are born to success and long life and some are not!" The individual who permits himself to get into that frame of mind is doomed and no one can help him. Such reasoning is of course all nonsense. John Wesley was always a spare eater. Yet he lived an active outdoor life, often traveling forty and even sixty miles a day on horseback. He never failed to keep an appointment on account of the weather. And he was a tireless worker, often preaching four and five times a day. At the same time he read and wrote every spare moment, turning out a large amount of literary work.

Dr. Eliot, ex-President of Harvard College, a constant writer and speaker, and among the greatest of American educators—now nearer 90 than 80 years of age—is also a moderate eater. He says, "I have always eaten moderately of simple food in great variety. This practice is probably the result, first, of a natural tendency, and then of confirmed habit and much experience under varying conditions of work and play. From much observation of eating habits of other people, both the young and the mature, I am convinced that moderation, simplicity, and variety in eating are more important than any other bodily habit towards maintaining good health, power of work, and, barring accidents, attaining to enjoyable old age."

It is interesting to note what that eminent lawyer, legislator, and orator, Chauncey M. Depew, had to say on the occasion of his eighty-seventh birthday about a simple diet and reaching the century mark. "The true philosophy of life is this: The more you like a thing the more reason there is for giving it up if you find it is not good for you. If you treat nature properly, nature will adjust herself to you.

"My diet is very simple. I have the same breakfast every day in the year, and it consists of an orange, one four-minute egg, one half of a corn muffin, and a cup of coffee which is mainly hot milk. I have this at half past eight. My hour of rising is seven every morning.

"For luncheon I partake principally of vegetables, with no meat, and a glass of water. This is at one o'clock. At dinner I skip most of the courses and enjoy small portions of vegetables, fish, and fowl. I never eat between meals and consume now less than half I did at fifty."

The vigor and long life of Bishop Fallows of Chicago are mainly due to his living and mental habits and to his simple diet. He is well over 85 years of age, but few men of three-score years can do as much work, the year round. There are two or three sermons and several public addresses each week, and the work of a large parish—from marriages and christenings to funerals and parish visitings—which is never slighted. An active Grand Army man and Civil War veteran, he is asked to address countless military and patriotic gatherings, and his energy seems as tireless as his spirit is willing. His ability to meet these demands can be traced back to simple living and simple eating.

The Bishop is temperate in all things, and refuses to worry. He neither drinks nor smokes.

In regard to his diet he says, "I eat very little meat, but take plenty of fruit, cereals and vegetables. I take regularly before breakfast a cup of hot grape juice. I use it frequently at other times. I take buttermilk daily." Night and morning he takes simple physical exercises, and always walks at least a couple of miles each day.

The Bishop's ancestors were long-lived. His great grandfather lived to be 96; his grandfather, 91; his eldest brother, 93. His father's death from a fall occurred at the age of 81. He has a brother who is 92. This in itself is evidence that he comes of a family in which right living—which means simple living—has prevailed until its effects have shown in each succeeding generation.

The world-renowned American inventor, Thomas A. Edison, now in his 75th year, has today a mind as brilliant and ingenious, and a skill as remarkable for inventing things that are of practical use, as when at 21 he invented his automatic repeater which did so much for telegraphy. And Edison is another spare eater. What he ate at the three meals of the day on which he wrote the following letter, is characteristic of the small amount he eats every day in the year.

And you will learn that this is true of every man or woman who has lived long and is still doing active brain work. And so, once for all, let us think right about this matter. We get out of ourselves just about what we put into ourselves or do for ourselves in the way of food and exercise.

I well remember a man who came to me some years ago suffering from this malady. He had been trying to get well by doing heavy stunts in a gymnasium. He was very muscular, in fact he was an athlete, and was still under twenty-five years of age. His cheeks were ruddy, and to the ordinary observer he appeared to be in the pink of condition. But he had that peculiar expression of the eyes that flashed his story to me as plainly as if blazoned forth by the letters of an electric sign. I told him at once that he could never hope to cure his nerves by such violent exercises.

And right here let me advise men in this condition not to run. I receive many letters of inquiry from young men with broken-down nerves who tell me they are taking long walks and finishing with a run. To all such I say: Do not run. I know all about it for I have tried it. I was on my university football team. And all my life I have been fond of athletics. I am still fond of this kind of life and always expect to be, but exercise is frequently overdone by nervous people. Usually, the physically strong man who breaks down with "nerves" thinks at once of physical training. But strange as it may seem, you can make such a man's muscles as hard as iron but that alone will not cure him. And it is true that many people in this condition do not seem nervous for they are not at all shaky, as some think an individual should be if he is the victim of a nervous breakdown.

I well remember that one day when at my worst I could not work nor concentrate my mind on anything. I chanced to be in Topeka, Kansas, and passed a shooting gallery. I was a good rifle shot and I had been taking long walks and shooting Kansas jack rabbits. I went in, picked up one of the rifles, and started firing at the biggest target. I rang the bell twice on that target in succession, and then aimed at the finest target there and rang the bell twice in succession on that. The proprietor was very much surprised, saying it was remarkably good shooting; and yet I was down and out with "nerves." I have seen many athletes who, to the untrained observer, looked well, but who in reality were nervous wrecks. Outdoor exercise alone will not cure such people, or if seemingly it does—and this is important—sooner or later the individual is sure to go down again. You have first to remove the cause, and that is largely wrong diet. Now of course it is only reasonable to say that if such an individual does not get out of doors at all he cannot get well.

That is one trouble with many of our women today. They will go on a diet and stick to it, but they will not get out of doors. If they do go out, they ride a little distance in a street car or in an automobile to do some shopping. Or they go to a store and spend a good deal of time there—indoors, mind you—and then are whirled home again. Some of them seem to think that is taking outdoor exercise, but of course it is not. So many times they have said to me, "Why, I do get out!" Yes, they do get out, but they immediately go indoors again.

The nervous individual, unless the collapse is so severe that the first few weeks must be spent in bed, should get out of doors at least three or four hours a day, every day in the week. This is a general rule that should be observed by everyone. It takes genuine courage, I know, for a man or woman to spend this much time out of doors. And I know that those who are compelled to work for a living cannot take three hours all at one time. But labor conditions in this country are such that I am sure the vast majority of our people could spend this much time outdoors in wholesome recreation if they would make up their mind to do so.

And remember this: After the nervous person is cured he should never let anything prevent him from continuing such outdoor exercise. I am constantly trying to make this point—when you get well you should stay well. One breakdown is bad enough; don't have another. And you will not have another if you will change the habits of a lifetime as you are advised to do.

Among farmers there are many, the offspring of nervous parents with bad eating habits, who suffer from nervous breakdowns. So you see exercise out of doors alone will not cure such cases. Sometimes a farmer will tell me he fears to give up eating meat because he will grow weak as a result. But just here I wish to call your attention to the fact that there are nations that have for ages lived on this lacto-vegetarian diet. I myself have not eaten meat or eggs for ten years. At least I have not eaten them except the few times mentioned. And every time I did break the rule I was harmed far more than I was benefited. I am very sure the farmer who chooses this lacto-vegetarian diet will thrive on it.

Members of our profession discovered not very long ago that at an advanced age the peasants of Bulgaria are a wonderfully preserved people both mentally and physically. Foolishly a great number of the profession immediately jumped to the conclusion that buttermilk alone did the miracle for these people. The drinking of buttermilk became such a fad that some of the largest of our physicians' supply houses began and are still making "buttermilk tablets." And physicians, many of them, are credulous enough to prescribe them. They might just as well prescribe chalk. While buttermilk tablets are harmless, they are of no benefit whatever. How easily fooled people—physicians included—may be! Bulgarian peasants are strong and rugged and live to a great age not because they drink buttermilk, but because they live on milk and fruits and vegetables and stay out of doors. Buttermilk is a good healthful drink, but it is only a minor reason for the health and strength of the Bulgarian peasant. Now, really, could you think of anything more absurd than to prescribe buttermilk or buttermilk tablets as the fountain of youth when the patient is breaking all the laws of health, as most buttermilk laymen and physicians are doing? It seems almost impossible that people—physicians in particular—should for a moment believe such things. But they do. Barnum said there was a "sucker" born every minute, and this certainly seems to be true.

No, there is no royal road to health. The buttermilk-tablet route will not take you there. If you will live out of doors as Bulgarian peasants do, and if you will eat as they do,—as man is expected to eat,—you will live just as long as they do, and you will get a great deal more out of life and be much more helpful to others. When the "time" comes round for your next buttermilk tablet, do not take it. Instead, do as those peasants do—leave off eating meat and take a two-hour walk in the sunshine. Then when nine o'clock comes, like the Bulgarian, go to bed and stay there until morning.

If the person afflicted with "nerves" expects to get well and stay well, he must go to bed at an early hour and get eight or nine hours of sleep not only some nights but every night in the week. When one begins dieting and taking outdoor exercise he should go to bed regularly at an early hour even though he has not been sleeping well. No matter how many sleepless nights he has experienced before beginning this regime, he should retire early just the same, because, sooner or later, sleep will come and the relaxed body is resting even if the individual does not sleep. Now I have been through all this lying awake at night, so I know from experience that it is best to go to bed early and at a regular hour. If you can, you should sleep nine hours. Nervous people need more sleep than others. Sleep is a better restorer of nerves than anything else we can try. I do not believe that ten or even eleven hours' sleep would be harmful to a nervous adult, because very often I have seen such a person benefited by it.

Children should have all the sleep they want up to ten or twelve hours. But after a child has wakened in the morning he should be permitted to get up. It is not good for him to lie in bed after he wishes to rise, for nature is calling him to get up and exercise.

The nervous individual not only should exercise systematically out of doors but he should play some game. You remember when we were children how much we loved to play? Well, to give up play when we grow up is all nonsense. And just because people quit playing is the reason they have wrinkles and frowns. Did you ever notice how often people laugh when at play? There is something about play that compels one to laugh. And what all people need, nervous people and others as well, is to get into the habit of laughing more.

And it is not hard to find something to play. I like to play at basket ball with a child, and I can enjoy tossing a ball for an hour if the child will stick to the game that long. Playing basket ball in the open air on a sunshiny day is one of the very finest exercises in the world.

If you are suffering from "nerves" and are able to be out of doors at all,—I mean if you are well enough to be out, and at least nine out of ten sufferers are,—get a basket ball and get some one to play with you. If at first you are poor at catching the ball you will with practice improve. Gradually toss the ball a little higher and a little higher until you have difficulty in catching it. Any woman or girl can stand this sort of open air exercise. If the weather is cold, no matter; wrap up and play anyway. But enter into the game with spirit. Playing the regular game of basket ball is too violent exercise for the nervous person. The victim of "nerves" should always keep in mind that it is mild outdoor exercise that will do him good.

Tennis is too violent an exercise for people who have had nervous trouble. Anyway, there is no use in one's doing anything that will make his heart beat like a trip-hammer. A women can toss a basket ball and laugh and get rosy cheeks and grow younger and prettier as easily as when playing tennis.

Golf is also good exercise, but a large number of people who work for a living and suffer from "nerves" would have little chance for exercise if golf were all that could be offered them. Furthermore golf is practically only a summer game, and an individual belonging to the pre-nervous class needs outdoor exercise every day in the year. But golf is excellent exercise, and there is nothing better if one has the time to give to it and has access to links.

Bicycling is splendid exercise for nervous people, but automobiles are so numerous that it is now considered almost dangerous to ride a wheel on any of our main traveled roads.

Mountain climbing, I believe, is not to be recommended for most people suffering from "nerves." I have known such people to go to Colorado and spend some time climbing mountains, and then come back much worse than when they went away. My advice to the nervous person who goes to the mountains is to be out of doors all the time he can, but to take things easy. It would be better for such a person to walk about slowly on the level ground through some of the towns or along the foothills.

Let leisure be your watchword in a hill country. I know I injured my nerves out in Colorado one summer because I was ill advised. Mountain air is good for you, but the mountains will do you more good if you simply look at them. If you think you must go to the top, take a burro. You will find that the burro will give you a lesson in how to do things in a leisurely way. Do not get out of patience with him and whip him. Remember that the burro is smarter than you are in regard to the business of mountain climbing. He has never had a nervous breakdown, and if you will let him have his own way he never will have. It will do you good to let him have his way; he affords a tremendous lesson in patience. Patience, that's just what we need, and we need it badly.

Walking slowly in the open air for two or three hours is the best exercise for man. Fortunately, like the water we drink, it is free to the poor as well as the rich.

For the nervous man who is able to do it, I know of nothing better to build up muscles and keep the liver and other internal organs in good shape than sawing wood. Don't scorn this sort of exercise because you have been told that the ex-Kaiser is taking it. That is not to be laid up against the wood or the exercise, for, quite fortunately, the wood does not care who saws it.

Get some wood, then, and a buck saw, and saw wood for your own benefit. You can do this morning and evening. Wood sawing brings into play every muscle in the body, and the exercise is just enough to make a man comfortably tired without doing him harm.

Many people who go to sanitariums for a cure pay from fifty to seventy-five dollars per week for the privilege of sawing wood, and you can take this exercise just as well and at considerably less expense at home, sawing your own wood instead of that of the sanitarium.

Another splendid diversion for a man with "nerves," if he can have it, is a small workshop where he can make just any old thing out of boards and nails. If one is apt in this line, he can make things that will interest children. This sort of work requires a certain kind of concentration that is most excellent for the nervous sufferer. This suggestion would of course apply to a woman, too, if she cared to try such an experiment. Sewing, and especially fine needlework, is very trying to a woman's nerves, and if she has broken down under that kind of work she should quit it and do something else. If she has to make her living in that way, she of all people should observe the outdoor rules as well as rules for dieting.

I am sure nervous people profit by frequenting all possible outdoor games. If a number of people afflicted with "nerves" could get together and take daily walks and at the same time determine that their conversation should always have a humorous slant, it would help all of them wonderfully.

Riding in an automobile is beneficial if the machine is driven slowly and the patient is kept out of doors from three to four hours. But the fast driving that is generally done is bad for these people. They come back from a ride worse than when they started.

It may be set down as a general rule that any form of outdoor exercise or play is good for the nervous person if it is not violent.

Nervous people should, if possible, take a vacation once a year and get into new surroundings. I am certain, however, that it does not make any difference where one lives. A man is just as likely to have a breakdown in one part of the world as another. While on these vacations he should stick to his rules just as rigidly as when he is at home.

I have had letters from people in Canada and from others in Florida who have suffered nervous breakdowns. In California some go to pieces. I have had many letters from people living there who have broken down. People also break down in Colorado and in New York; in fact, in every state in the Union. Climate does not seem to make any difference so far as this trouble is concerned, with the exception that in high altitudes I have observed nervous people are inclined to be more restless than elsewhere. Some years ago I went up Pike's Peak, to the Summit House. I went to bed and spent the night there, but I do not say I slept, for in reality I slept only about half an hour. I was not at all sick at the stomach, as so many are who climb up there; I had prevented this by eating a very light breakfast and chewing my food to a cream. But I was extremely nervous. I have found a great many other nervous people who do not feel quite right when in a high altitude. As a general rule, sea level is as good a place as a nervous individual can find to live. But people break down there, too. The diet, you see, is the big thing. And when I say "diet" I mean the way food is eaten and the amount eaten quite as much as I do the kind of food eaten.

And once more let me say, systematic outdoor exercise also counts, and you can't keep fit if you exercise only one, two, or three days a week. Some people who take long walks in the country on Sunday think that will suffice. But it will not. You must have exercise every day and must have some play along with it. Gymnasium work is of very little value as compared to outdoor exercise.

In the summertime, gardening is a splendid form of exercise. And so is the care of a small flock of chickens, which is possible for those living in the smaller towns. It is always better, when taking outdoor exercise, to have something definite to do. When walking it is a good plan, if you can, to have some definite place to go. And if you have an agreeable companion to keep up a rapid-fire talk, that will help also. All these things are mentally stimulating.

Then, if possible, sleep the year round on a sleeping porch. If you don't possess a porch, then, have all the windows in your sleeping room wide open day and night.

If for a time you have to take physic, it is best to take some hot mineral water half an hour before breakfast. But adhering to dieting and exercise, and eating enough apples, usually overcomes constipation.

Now, there are some things about which a person must use his own good judgment. For instance, if you have any bad teeth you should at once go to a good dentist and have them attended to. Nobody with bad teeth can have good health.

Again, if your tonsils have become mere pus sacs you will have to go to a good nose and throat specialist and have them removed before you can expect to have good health. This, however, applies to all people, whether nervous or not.

The same thing is true with regard to your eyes. If you are suffering from eye strain because you need glasses, you cannot hope to get well of "nerves" until your eyes are properly fitted to glasses by some reliable eye specialist. These are things that each individual must discover and do for himself. He should consult a dentist, an oculist, an aurist, or other specialist according to his particular need.