SEVERAL years ago I came into Christian Science, or rather was taken to it, and was healed. My ailment was the direct result of an accident aboard a large ship. Orders had been given to get up anchor, and while I was supervising this work the gear parted, and the chain, pulled out by a four-ton anchor, whipped against my leg, splintering the bones and throwing me to the deck, where my back struck a ring-bolt. After the usual experience in the hospital and on crutches, I walked with the aid of a stick, and was then conscious of severe pains in my back and in the uninjured leg. The surgeons tried to relieve this by building up the heel of the boot of the injured leg, which was about a half inch shorter than the other; but this served no purpose, though the pains finally yielded to other modes of treatment.
Several times during the succeeding years the same pains returned, but my physician was always able to help, until some eight years after the accident, when the trouble became so acute that I was kept from business for months. I was at last helped by a physician who made a specialty of chronic ailments. However, when the trouble returned another eight years later, neither my regular physician nor the specialist could relieve me at all, and after being treated by them for many weeks, during which I was constantly growing worse, I tried another system; but it was to no purpose, and by this time I was in such a condition that the only way in which I was able to get even slight relief was to lie on the floor, as I learned that a hard, unyielding surface would give surcease from the pain, which was so intense that my hair became very gray in less than a week's time.
At this period it was impossible for me to stand, walk, or sit for more than a few minutes at a time, and I next tried electrical treatment. This was a matter of but a few days, for the specialist told me that the best thing to do was to go home, be done up in a plaster cast, and remain in bed for some three or four months. This did not seem very satisfactory, so one of the best, if not the best, orthopedic surgeons in this city was consulted. After a preliminary examination he recommended that an X-ray photograph be taken, and this, when developed, showed an injury to the vertebrae. The corrective treatment given consisted largely in the cauterization of the affected parts; but after perhaps a half dozen applications I was told that the best thing for me to do was to go South with a nurse or companion, and take a good rest, although the doctor afterward said that he really could not tell me what to do in order to get well.
