matism may force an entry.

Colds do not "run into" consumption or pneumonia, but they bear much the
same relation to them that good intentions are said to do to the
infernal regions. They release the lid of a perfect Pandora's box of
distempers--tuberculosis, pneumonia, rheumatism, bronchitis, Bright's
disease, neuritis, endocarditis. A cold is no longer a joke. A
generation ago a prominent physician was asked by an anxious mother,
"Doctor, how would you treat a cold?"

"With contempt, madam," replied the great man.

That day is past, and has lasted too long. Intelligently regarded and
handled, they are the least harmful of diseases; neglected, one of the
most dangerous, because there are such legions of them. To sum up, if
you wish to revel in colds, all that is necessary is to observe the
following few and simple rules:--

Keep your windows shut.

Avoid drafts as if they were a pestilence.

Take no exercise between meals.

Bathe seldom, and in warm water.

Wear heavy flannels, chest-protectors, abdominal bandages, and electric
insoles.

Have no heat in your bedroom.

Never let anything keep you away from church, the theatre, or parties,
in winter.

Never go out-of-doors when it's windy, or rainy, or wet underfoot, or
cold, or hot, or looks as if it was going to be any of these.

Be just as intimate and affectionate as possible with every one you know
who has a cold. Don't neglect them on any account.

CHAPTER V

ADENOIDS, OR MOUTH-BREATHING: THEIR CAUSE AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES

In all ages it has been accounted a virtue to keep your mouth
shut--chiefly, of course, upon moral or prudential grounds, for fear of
what might issue from it if opened. Then came physiology to back up the
maxim, on the ground that the open mouth was also dangerous on account
of what might be inhaled into it. Oddly enough, in this instance, both
morality and science have been beside the mark to the degree that they
have been mistaking a symptom for a cause. This has led us to absurd and
injurious extremes in both cases. On the moral and prudential side it
has led to such outrageous exaggerations as the well-known and
oft-quoted proverb, "Speech is silver, but silence is golden."
Articulate speech, the chiefest triumph and highest single
accomplishment of the human species, the handmaid of thought and the
instrument of progress, is actually rated below silence, the attribute
of the clod and of the dumb brute, the easy