CHAPTER XIII.
A World of High Medical Knowledge.
SPENT a long and profitable season in the vicinity of the Great Dipper, witnessing the almost infinite variations of human life as found from world to world, and looking upon the wild wastes of the many planets that are not inhabited.
Finally I again spread my swift wings, reached the beautiful star Arcturus and noticed among the worlds that revolve around it a few that are sinless. I was tempted to pause at one or another of those exceptional stations, but I knew that I could not tarry until I had reached the far distant constellation of Scorpio.
In this wide flight I traveled a distance so great that I will not weary the mind with mentioning the trillions of miles. Now I was in the direct path of the Milky Way and my imagination staggered as I saw the endlessness of stars and solar systems, as far out beyond me as my assisted eyes could reach.
The star at which I arrived is one of the largest suns that blaze in the depths of immensity. It is so wonderfully great that if twelve hundred million worlds as large as ours were all crushed into one great ball, it would not make one sphere as immense as this star or sun, around which revolve about five hundred worlds or planets, many of which are greater than our Jupiter. With abounding interest I visited all the inhabited worlds of this vast system. How long it took I have no way of knowing. I did not count time by hours or heart throbs, for I was so wrapt in my observations that all else was as nothing to me.
Some of these worlds sustain a low order of human creatures, while on others there are races that have reached a high degree in the scale of advancement. Of these five hundred worlds nearly one-half are barren of all life, and of those that are inhabited some twenty are sinless worlds and thirty are now passing through an intermediate period between the probationary life and the final judgment, a period toward which we are anxiously looking and which we designate as the Millennium.
Of all this ponderous solar system there is one world that excels all the others in its medical attainments, and of this one first I will give a flying notice.
I have named this world Dore-lyn. It is fifty times as large as our Earth and of greater specific gravity.
Its human creatures are delightfully formed and are in ruddy health and refined happiness. In shape these Dore-lynites differ somewhat from us, but long before I had reached this planet I learned something of the universal standards of symmetry and ascertained that creatures could be beautiful without resembling us whatever.
Here I found four billions of people and there is room for twenty billions more. So if you are in ill health, and have run the round of our medical fraternity without success, I would advise you to go to Dore-lyn, if you know how to reach it
These Dore-lynites are almost three times our size and they are subject to most of our ills and many more. From an early date the head government of this world paid particular attention to hygiene, keeping all medical work under its own care.
The government controls the whole field of medical science just as we do the post-office department.
There are no conflicting schools of medicines such as Allopathic, Homeopathic, Hydropathic, Eclectic and Osteopathic. The government gives handsome rewards to any one who furnishes a new discovery or gives additional light. Everything is duly tested and proved to be a success by a corps of experts before it is given to the practicing fraternity. The government holds certain rights in experimenting that no physician or medical school would think of having in our world. The government medical schools of Dore-lyn are marvels indeed. Nothing is spared that money or talent can furnish. The full graduates of these schools are only "the survival of the fittest." Others take a secondary degree and can act as assistants or retire from the list. The government has a series of institutions that do a work similar to our hospitals and have a corps of full graduates supplying the stations. This entire system is so arranged that every family or individual receives all necessary treatment free.
The cost of carrying on this vast system is one of the items of national expense. I will now mention some of the medical achievements of these Dore-lynites.
When a physician suspects that the blood is poisoned he at once proceeds to a chemical analysis, and if certain kinds of poison are found, the blood is filtered by the use of a fine instrument. A blood vessel is exposed and cut, and the two ends fastened to the delicate filter. Thus the blood is cleansed by passing through this instrument. Those acquainted with the manner in which the blood circulates can readily see how all the blood of the body can be reached in a short time. This method is very successful in the treatment of all bites of poisonous insects and reptiles, and all types of hydrophobia, which are ten-fold more numerous in Dore-lyn than in our world.
There are no patent medicines in Dore-lyn. The few medicines they have are manufactured only by government authority and everybody receives the purest that can be compounded, no distinction being made between rich and poor. One thousand years ago the medical aspects of Dore-lyn were similar to those which are seen in our world to-day. People were compelled to take all manner of poisons and opiates even from skilled hands. But in Dore-lyn those days of darkness and misery are past and the people enjoy the benefit of a medical skill one thousand years ahead of us. They look back to the practice of the old physicians with ludicrous feelings just as we do when reading the prescriptions that were used in the first century of our dispensation.
We call your attention to some of the antiquated remedies of our world as related by Geike and copied from a medical journal of our own country. Following is a list:
"Ashes of wolf's skull, stag's horn, the heads of mice, the eyes of crabs, owl's brains, liver of frogs, viper's fat, grasshoppers, bats, etc, these supplied the alkalis which were prescribed. Physicians were accustomed to order doses of the gall of wild swine. It is presumed the tame hog was not sufficiently efficacious. There were other choice prescriptions such as horse's foam, woman's milk, laying a serpent on the afflicted part, urine of cows, bear fat, still recommended as a hair restorative, juice of boiled buck horn, etc. For colic, powdered horse's teeth, dung of swine, asses' kidneys, mice excretion made into a plaster, and other equally vile and unsavory compounds. Colds in the head were cured by kissing the nose of a mule. For sore throat, snail slime was a favorite prescription, and mouse flesh was considered excellent for disease of the lungs. Boiled snails and powdered bats were prescribed for intestinal disorders."
When we read such a list of remedies we can scarcely believe that they were ever popular, but according to the history of Dore-lyn the time will come when many of our present medicines will be out of date, and only mentioned in the old medical works.
The people of Dore-lyn have suffered in past ages innumerable woes on account of intemperance. Alcohol is unknown to them, but they have had a two-thousand year's battle against three liquids that affect them as opium affects us. Strange to say that these terrible liquids were the bases of many of their medicines just like the anodyne medicines of our present day. Thus in Dore-lyn the old kinds of medicines created many drunkards. Since the dawn of the brighter age, a strict law prevails regarding the use of all narcotics in medicines. Then came gradually into use the many methods of treating disease without medicine, except the materials used to sustain life regularly.
Being interested in these things, I examined more closely into their past medical history, and saw more clearly the present folly of a certain part of our medicinal practice. How we are struggling with alcohol, especially as found in so many of our patent medicines, and how helpless we are in trying to abolish the sale of these medicines by reason of our unbounded liberty! In our world, a man may concoct any alcoholic medicine and sell it without liquor license, for people become verily mad for the bottled stuff. Our nation may some day become wise enough to keep its own hand on the business that is determining the health and happiness of millions of its inhabitants.
But let me cease this digression and get back once more to Dore-lyn.
One of the most noted medical achievements on this world consists in the manner of rendering a person unconscious of pain. The anatomy of a Dore-lynite is, in general, the same as our anatomy. Their bones are arranged a little differently and the sections of the backbone have a quite different formation. When a surgeon of that world wishes to perform an operation and therefore render the patient unconscious, he presses the tough cartilagenous part of a section of the backbone with a screw device fastened to the body of the patient. This simple act renders the spinal cord insensitive, which condition may be maintained for hours without injuring the patient. Of course any point above the screw device is sensitive, and for this reason it is more difficult to render a person unconscious in the parts about the head.
Many ages ago the world of microbes was laid bare, but not before these people were masters of the microscope or an instrument serving the same purposes, although formed on a partly different principle.
These Dore-lynites have brought to light the numerous varieties of parasite broods that cause fermentations and diseases, both infectious and otherwise.
A diseased body is looked upon as being in possession of a certain brood of microbes which are destroyed either by the blood filter or the "Vaccine bath, or injection." (I know no better name by which to call it.) A few diseases are treated by doses of medicines given in a manner similar to the prescription system of our country.
The "Food Treatment" is also very popular in Dore-lyn. This is merely a hygienic selection of foods given to people of declining health, instead of having them swallow ten or twenty dollars' worth of strong medicines.
Abnormal appetites crave for a class of foods injurious to the system. In Dore-lyn they have discovered a novel method of rurning the diseased appetite from its cravings toward the things needed by the system.
In performing operations, the experts of Dore-lyn have reached a marvelous degree of perfection. They have learned to make a false eye so that one can see with it. It took three and one-half thousand years of continual experimenting on this delicate creation before it was pronounced satisfactory.
The false eye is not of flesh but one of manufacture. It is placed in sensitive connection with the optic nerve, on which images are thrown by the delicate mechanism of the false eye. The sight thus obtained is almost one-half as distinct as that which is enjoyed by the normal eye.
These medical wizards also make artificial ears which are about as satisfactory as the natural ears. In certain lines of surgery we are equal to these Dore-lynites, but we cannot register with them in the whole category of surgical achievements. They have simply distanced us by five hundred years. That is, I believe that in five hundred years we can reach the fields of glory which they now occupy.
Think of laying bare a human lung and treating it with a special preparation for extreme cases of lung diseases, and also treating it with a "baking" for department cases of a disease similar to pneumonia. Perhaps the most wonderful class of operations is performed on the heart and the brain.
The heart is laid bare under a sheet of thermal rays. Fatty tissues are removed and other obstructions eradicated during the regular heart beats.
The government grants certain privileges of experimenting on her lowest class of criminals, and it is well nigh incredible what has been accomplished by cerebrum operations.
Certain murderers of vile propensities have been so changed by an operation on the cerebrum that they have no power of recalling their past life and are incapable of uttering an oath. And what is more strange, they are intent on leading an upright life and being intensely religious withal.
I am compelled to crowd a world of glorious life into a few paragraphs, but I hope that I have given such as will be for our good.