t read to
them.]

Sick children, if not too shy to speak, will always express this wish.
They invariably prefer a story to be _told_ to them, rather than read to
them.

V. VARIETY.

[Sidenote: Variety a means of recovery.]

To any but an old nurse, or an old patient, the degree would be quite
inconceivable to which the nerves of the sick suffer from seeing the
same walls, the same ceiling, the same surroundings during a long
confinement to one or two rooms.

The superior cheerfulness of persons suffering severe paroxysms of pain
over that of persons suffering from nervous debility has often been
remarked upon, and attributed to the enjoyment of the former of their
intervals of respite. I incline to think that the majority of cheerful
cases is to be found among those patients who are not confined to one
room, whatever their suffering, and that the majority of depressed cases
will be seen among those subjected to a long monotony of objects about
them.

The nervous frame really suffers as much from this as the digestive
organs from long monotony of diet, as e.g. the soldier from his
twenty-one years' "boiled beef."

[Sidenote: Colour and form means of recovery.]

The effect in sickness of beautiful objects, of variety of objects, and
especially of brilliancy of colour is hardly at all appreciated.

Such cravings are usually called the "fancies" of patients. And often
doubtless patients have "fancies," as e.g. when they desire two
contradictions. But much more often, their (so called) "fancies" are the
most valuable indications of what is necessary for their recovery. And
it would be well if nurses would watch these (so called) "fancies"
closely.

I have seen, in fevers (and felt, when I was a fever patient myself),
the most acute suffering produced from the patient (in a hut) not being
able to see out of window, and the knots in the wood being the only
view. I shall never forget the rapture of fever patients over a bunch of
bright-coloured flowers. I remember (in my own case) a nosegay of wild
flowers being sent me, and from that moment recovery becoming more
rapid.

[Sidenote: This is no fancy.]

People say the effect is only on the mind. It is no such thing. The
effect is on the body, too. Little as we know about the way in which we
are affected by form, by colour, and light, we do know this, that they
have an actual physical effect.

Variety of form and brilliancy of colour in the objects