medical agent.

Mrs. A., infected with scrofula of the left breast, and in a state of
ulceration, applied to me two years since. The ulcer was then the size
of a half-dollar, and discharged a considerable quantity of imperfect
pus. The axillary glands were much enlarged, and, doubting the
practicability of operating with the knife in such cases, I told her the
danger of her disease, and ordered her to subsist upon bread and milk
and some fruit, drink water, and keep the body of as uniform temperature
as possible. I ordered the sore to be kept clean by ablutions of tepid
water. In less than three months, the ulcer was all healed, and her
general health much improved. The axillary glands are still enlarged,
though less so than formerly.

She still lives simply, and enjoys good health; but she tells me if she
tastes flesh meat, it produces a twinging in the breast.

Many cases, like the above, have come under my observation and immediate
attention, and suffice it to say, I have never failed to ameliorate the
condition of every individual that has applied to me, who was suffering
under chronic affections, if they would follow my prescriptions--unless
the system was incapable of reaction.

Yours, truly,
N. J. KNIGHT.

LETTER V.--FROM DR. LESTER KEEP.

FAIR HAVEN, Jan. 22, 1838.

DEAR SIR,--Agreeably to your request, I will inform you that from
September, 1834, to June, 1836, I used no meat at all, except
occasionally in my intercourse with society, I used a little to avoid
attracting notice.

When I commenced my studies, life was burdensome. I knew not, for
months, and I may say years, what enjoyment comfortable health affords.
In a great many ways I can now see that I very greatly erred in my
course of living. I am surprised that the system will hold out in its
powers during so long a process in the use of what I should now consider
the means best calculated to break it down.

I cannot now particularize. But in college, and during my professional
studies, and since, during six or eight years of practice in an arduous
profession, I have been greatly guilty, and neglected those means best
calculated to promote and preserve health; and used those means best
fitted to destroy it. The summers of 1832, 1833, and 1834, were pretty
much lost, from wretched health. I was growing worse every year, and no
medicines that I could prepare for myself, or that were prescribed by
various brother physicians, had a