DYSPEPSIA

(Gr. hvs, and tri^Tu, I digest or concoct.) Indigestion. This is a complaint from which few entirely escape, which a umes an infinite variety of shapes and symptoms, and which arises from many causes. In the higher ranks of society, and amongst the luxurious and opulent, it is a common consequence of over eating, or of indulgence in difficultly digestible or over-stimulating food, or of want of due exercise and general bodily and mental exertion. In others it results from mental anxiety and labour a ociated with a sedentary life; from the fatigues of busine , or the influence of debilitating pa ions. In the lower orders it is the constant result of indulgence in spirituous liquors, combined in many instances with want of proper food, the means which ought to be applied to procuring it being disposed of in the gin shop. The symptoms of dyspepsia vary, therefore, in the different grades of life. The epicure loses his relish for the most refined dishes, becomes bloated, plethoric, heavy, and perhaps apoplectic; the lady of fashion suffers from headaches, flatulence, occasional giddine , and dimne of sight; she becomes indolent, capricious, and full of fancies, or, as the old physicians used to say, she has the vapours,• the studious man feels the intensity of his mind blunted, loses his appetite, or at least all enjoyment of meals, sleeps ill, and dreams much, gets whimsical and discontented with himself and his friends, and becomes a hypochondriac j the lower cla es at first take their gla of gin or of rum because they find it a cheap stimulant, little thinking of the misery they are laying up for future years; this stimulant soon becomes habitual, and they not only feel miserable and heartbroken without it, but the single gla soon loses its efficacy, and the dose must be gradually increased till they degenerate into regular tipplers, the aspect and characters of whom it were needle to describe, as they may be daily and hourly studied in those hells of temptation and iniquity, the gin shops of London, — where it is curious and instructive, but humiliating and alarming, to witne the various grades of mental and bodily disease in the men, women, and even children, who there immolate to Satan. Complicated as are the symptoms of dyspepsia, and numerous as are the remedies and modes of treatment proposed for its relief or cure, they really resolve themselves into a few simple rules. In the majority of cases, abstinence is the first and most e ential step: the epicure must abstain from the luxuries of the table, eat and drink with moderation, rise betimes, and use due exercise; the woman of fashion must revert to regular hours, that is, BB 2 [s. 384]