could do little for her to any valuable purpose,
and was glad to send her to the elder Dr. Jackson, of Boston. Not,
however, till I had given her to understand, in general, that aside from
her scrofulous tendencies, I did not know what ailed her; and that, so
far as I could understand her case, her safest course was to avoid
medicine and depend almost wholly on a careful obedience to God's laws,
physical and moral, especially to his laws of hygiene. I had not then
fully learned how much she had been abused, in early life, by
unnecessary dosing and drugging.

Dr. Jackson told her it was evident there was something in her case very
much out of the way; but he would be honest with her, and confess that
he did not know what it was. He proposed to have Dr. Putnam see her, and
another physician at Lowell. He insisted, however, on a more nutritious
diet.

The last suggestion was heeded for awhile, but evidently to her
disadvantage. Under the impression that in order to obtain more
nutriment she must do so, she suddenly returned to the free use of
flesh, butter, eggs, milk, etc., which, for a long time, till now, she
had refused. This course brought upon her much acidity of the stomach.
She returned once more to the plain diet, and by avoiding extremes and
letting alone medicine, according to the general tenor of my directions,
she partly recovered, and seemed destined to still higher advance
towards the land of health and life.

But here, again, domestic trials, like a flood, came upon her, and
brought her into great mental anxiety and embarrassment, as well as into
that weak and vacillating condition which had once before existed, and
which I have already described. To-day she would use her well-balanced,
plain diet; to-morrow, perhaps, resort to the starvation system, for a
few days. Then, in the fear of suffering from that, she would resort
again, for a few days, to luxurious living.

Now, too, she would adhere to and follow this physician, now that, and
next, none at all; or, perchance, follow some quack. I was not in a
situation to exert much influence over her, or it is possible she might
still have been saved. She would, indeed, adhere to my general plan,
when all else that promised more seemed to fail, and perhaps would have
been more persevering, but for her friends. They wanted to have the
"prophet" do "some great thing," and cure her as by magic or miracle.

In saying these things, it is far enough from being