'Hurried to death', or, A few words of advice on the danger of hurry and excitement : especially addressed to railway travellers / by Alfred Haviland.

  • Haviland, Alfred, -1903.
Date:
1868
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: 'Hurried to death', or, A few words of advice on the danger of hurry and excitement : especially addressed to railway travellers / by Alfred Haviland. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    therefore, now try to impress upon him the necessity of avoiding one thing, which he too frequently and thought- lessly does, to his great inconvenience when in health, and to his peril when unsound. “It would be interesting to know, as a statistical fact, the number of persons that have fallen down dead whilst hurrying to the train. Most of us can remember some friend or acquaintance who has overdone himself by this unwise haste ; and even if death has not taken place at once, a fatal warning has been given, which, if unheeded, sooner or later must be followed by fatal consequences. No one can estimate the amount of disease that has been revealed, we will not say developed, on the platform or in the railway-carriage; for there many a person who pre- viously had prided himself on being sound as a bell, has found, to his utter dismay, a flaw where he least expected one. “ Whether a person be diseased or sound, one law must always be remembered—never to overexert oneself when the stomach is full. If we want to break our horse’s wind, we need only to urge him to the top of his speed immediately after he has been fed and watered. Un- fortunately, this is exactly what hundreds of people do to themselves every day. When they have injured themselves, or, at least, so soon as they have discovered that they have done so, they come to our consulting-rooms, and, whilst the evil is present, subscribe to our rules and follow our prescription; but even these forget at times what they carry about with them, and thoughtlessly risk their lives by acting in opposition to our precepts in the hurry of business or pleasure.