69
and -winter were alike trying; very heavy -.voollen
clothing had to be v;orn nearly all through the year,
the feet had to be en cased in two pairs cf thick
woollen socks inside the shoes. Almost every year
there was e chronic cough which lasted till summer*
This interfered very greatly with sleep/ as the
coughing fit usually began about bed-time and went
on till about three in the rnorning-
" But the worst part of the trouble was intangible,
being wholly mental; spells of melancholy and
despair were very frequent and each spell lasted
long; sleep would often be cut short by nightmares
or fearsome dreams ; thoughts of suicide were haunt-
ing the mind; it was felt that at any time a suicidal
mania might arise and overpower the mind; hence
the sufferer had to give a wide berth to wells in
lonely spaces and to railway lines when trains might
be coming. The memory was weakened; the
power of attention was also declining; it was next
to impossible fo listen to clients' accounts of their
law cases, or two think coherently in the course of
business. The author (Sri K. Lakshman ) had nouri-
shed the hope of winning fame as an author from
his boyhood—a hope, which had been encouraged
by many circumstances; but the rising tide of
dyspepsia soon quenched it utterely. There was
only one hope—from death, the friend of the hope-
lessly afflicted; to retire to a lonely place outside
the town, and sit there, meditating on death and
the after-life, was a pleasant occupation.
" The doctors said that there was no disease
and that it was all imaginary; but that was because
they did not know the right means of cure ; they
were foolish enough to say" that the sufferer had
only to imagine himself cured in order to be quite
healthy. Perhaps they got this notion fom Emile
Coue, the advocate of auto-suggestion.