Personal Experience of a Physician | Page 3

man about forty years of age. Under the action of the
Aconite and Bryonia the patient about held his own, neither gaining nor
losing very perceptibly for about three days. At the end of that period I
became alarmed, and felt that if the patient were to die I should be

guilty of the crime of manslaughter. I discontinued the treatment, and
resorted to the then regular antiphlogistic treatment; the patient
immediately began to get worse, and at the end of three days more he
was a very sick man. I then came to the conclusion that my patient had
done much better under the homoeopathic treatment than he had under
the Allopathic, and I discontinued the latter and returned to the former,
giving the Aconite and Bryonia. The patient ceased to grow worse; he
held his own for two or three days, then he began to improve, and was
soon restored to health. From that day to this I have never bled a patient
suffering from either pneumonia or pleurisy, neither have I applied a
blister, or given a cathartic, or an Allopathic dose of tartar emetic, or an
opiate, or any form of alcoholic or fermented drinks, either during the
continuance of the above-named diseases or during convalescence; nor
have I ever regretted, in a single instance, not having done so.
During the fall of the year we had many cases of dysentery which were
very obstinate, continuing one or two weeks or longer, attended by a
fever approaching a typhoid character. I found the Allopathic treatment
unsatisfactory, as there were quite a number of deaths. So I consulted
my homoeopathic books and concluded to try the remedies; but at that
time I had only the six carefully prepared remedies given me by the
physician in Northampton, and I found that I needed some other
remedies; so for Arsenicum I used a drop of Fowler's solution of
arsenic in a glassful of water, giving a teaspoonful of the solution thus
prepared for a dose, and I also used the tincture of Colocynth and other
remedies in the same manner. Even with the help of such crude
remedies I found that I could generally control the disease far more
speedily and with greater certainty and safety than by Allopathic
treatment.
I was called to attend a young man who, while stooping over to set a
trap in the woods, was mistaken for a bear by a comrade who was
hunting with him, and shot through the neck. To restrain secondary
hemorrhage I was obliged, in order to save the life of my patient, to
ligature both carotid arteries at the interval of only four and one-half
days, which, at that time, had never been done successfully at an
interval of less than twelve months between the operations. My patient

did not suffer from head symptoms, as I was fearful he would, but his
lungs became seriously congested. I resorted to the Allopathic
treatment without affording any relief; and, as he was steadily getting
worse, I consulted my homoeopathic works and gave him Aconite, a
drop of the tincture in a glass of water; of the solution thus made I
directed a teaspoonful to be given every hour; this gave prompt relief to
the active symptoms of congestion. For a cough which remained I gave
a few doses of belladonna prepared in the same manner, and all of the
symptoms soon disappeared. I reported this case to the New York
Journal of Medicine, and it was transferred, even to the homoeopathic
prescriptions, to the American edition of Velpeau's great work on
surgery.
I found when I went to Grand Rapids that the intermittent, remittent,
and pernicious fevers, which prevailed in that place and in the
surrounding country, were generally treated by the resident physicians
with mercurial or other cathartic remedies, followed or accompanied by
Quinine and brandy or fermented drinks containing Alcohol, and
opiates where they were supposed to be necessary. As I began to look
into homoeopathy, I first prescribed Ipecac for the vomiting which
sometimes attended these fevers, one drop of the tincture in a glass of
water, and giving a teaspoonful from the glass for a dose. For watery
diarrhoeas I gave Fowler's solution of Arsenic in the same manner, and
in both instances generally with very satisfactory results. As my
confidence in the homoeopathic treatment of diseases increased, I sent
to New York and obtained an assortment of the remedies and more
books, and was then much better prepared to prescribe successfully. I
soon found that by their use I could dispense with cathartic remedies
and thus avoid the danger of causing a medicinal irritation of the
bowels, which it is sometimes difficult to control. I also found that I
could do much better without Alcohol in any