Diseases > Domestic medicine

BUCHAN
406
and high-seasoned food. They ought likewise to
to guard against all violent passions, and to avoid
the extremes of heat and cold. The head should be
shaved, and daily washed with cold water. The feet
ought to be kept warm, and never suffered to continue
long wet. The body must be kept open either by food or
medicine, and a little blood may be let every spring
and fall. Exercise should by no means be neglected;
hut it ought to be taken in moderation. Nothing has
a more happy effect in preventing an apoplexy
than perpetual issues or sefons ; great care how¬
ever must be taken not to suffer them to dry up,
without opening others in their stead. Apoplectic
persons ought never to go to rest with a full stomach,
or to lie with their heads low, or wear any thing too
tight about their necks.
CHAP. XLII.
COSTIVENESS, AND OTHER AFFECTIONS OF THE
STOMACH AND BOWELS.
We do not here mean to treat of those astrctions
of the bowels, which are the symptoms of diseases,
as of the colic, the iliac passion, &c. but only to
take notice of that infrequency of stools which
sometimes happens, and which in some particular
constitutions may occasion diseases.
Costiveness may proceed from drinking rough red
wines, or other astringent liquors ; too much exercise,
especially on horseback. It may likewise proceed
from a long use of cold insipid food, which does not
sufficiently stimulate the intestines. Sometimes it
is owing to the bile not descending to the intestines,
as in the jaundice; and at other times it proceeds