your money? Do you avoid excess and imprudence in the one case with the
same care as extravagance or foolish speculations in the other? Do you
keep as regular accounts of your mode of living as you do of your income?
Do you consider every evening what has been wholesome or unwholesome for
you, with the same care that you bring to the examination of your
expenditure? You may smile; but have you not brought this illness on
yourself by a thousand indiscretions?"

I began to protest against this, and asked him to point out these
indiscretions. The old doctor spread out his fingers, and began to
reckon upon them one by one.

"Primo," cried he, "want of exercise. You live here like a mouse in a
cheese, without air, motion, or change. Consequently, the blood
circulates badly, the fluids thicken, the muscles, being inactive, do not
claim their share of nutrition, the stomach flags, and the brain grows
weary.

"Secundo. Irregular food. Caprice is your cook; your stomach a slave
who must accept what you give it, but who presently takes a sullen
revenge, like all slaves.

"Tertio. Sitting up late. Instead of using the night for sleep, you
spend it in reading; your bedstead is a bookcase, your pillows a desk!
At the time when the wearied brain asks for rest, you lead it through
these nocturnal orgies, and you are surprised to find it the worse for
them the next day.

"Quarto. Luxurious habits. Shut up in your attic, you insensibly
surround yourself with a thousand effeminate indulgences. You must have