Here in Colorado, however, the invalid can find comfortable and adequate accommodations at reasonable rates. He can enjoy the comforts of settled communities at the same time that he is putting himself under superb climatic conditions. He will have access to a market which can amply supply his demands, even should he desire such delicacies as a live lobster or oysters in the shell. He will be in direct telegraphic and postal communication with his home, and, should occasion demand, can walk the streets of Boston within three days of leaving Denver.
These are considerations of no little weight to the invalid, for he is a human being, sensitive like other human beings—in fact, rather more dependent on the comforts of life than other men—and he protests, and rightly too, that it is cruel to impose conditions on him which would depress and render sick even a strong and able-bodied man.
The idea which has been so prevalent, and which even now is not entirely eradicated, that to regain health it is necessary to "rough it," and the greater the privations one endures, the more he roughs it, the sooner he will get well, is an erroneous and most cruel one.
It is not necessary to pander to the consumptive so as to make him a hypochondriac; and yet, on the other hand, we protest against the rough usage so often entailed upon him, which would seem to justify the idea that the only way of curing the disease is by fairly knocking it out of a man.
We consider the proper regulation of an invalid's life as regards exercise, diet, hygienic conditions, accommodations for living, etc., as of great importance—equal, it may be, to considerations of climate.
We have already[1] given to the public our opinion of what they can expect to find, on such scores, in Colorado, and need not now weary the reader with a repetition.
We at that time took occasion to mention the kind of cases that, in our opinion, should not come to Colorado, and we will now briefly repeat the advice. It is an excellent place for persons in whom a recovery can reasonably be expected, but it is not a place where consumptives should be sent as a last resort.
In conclusion, we can only say that, if the figures and arguments we have adduced are not convincing, or if the reader is skeptical about the ranges of temperature and unbelieving in regard to the heating effects of the direct solar rays, or the further fact that low temperatures do not feel so cold in our light and dry air as at sea-level, or if he can not reconcile the facts presented with any theory he may hold, we can only say to such a one, "Come and see."
The theories in regard to the beneficial elements of elevated regions may be entirely erroneous. Men's theories are constantly changing, and it may or may not be true that elevation, dryness, and sunshine
- ↑ "Colorado for Invalids," "Popular Science Monthly," July, 1884.
