To both, perhaps, an explanation of what a cold really is may be useful, not only for prevention, but for cure. The cause is simply this: The skin, with its myriads of perspiration pores, becomes contracted by long exposure to damp or cold, and thereby prevents the secretion which is necessary to health being carried off in the natural manner. The amount of insensible perspiration in a healthy person daily is about two pints. Thus, when it cannot pass off through the outer skin, it is diverted inwardly upon the mucous surfaces of the body, and the first symptoms of a cold in the head set in. There is a tightness in the nose and forehead, sneezing, and watering at the eyes, and a redness in the interior of the nose, from excess of blood. After a day or two, a thin running from the nose sets in, and the salts in it, which should pass off by the skin, make the upper lip red and sore. The question is, therefore, knowing the nature of a cold, what is the best way to restore the natural action of the skin, and get rid of its substitute as soon as possible? Many ways are recommended. A Dover’s powder—which consists of ipecacuanha and opium—is without doubt one of the best remedies at the commencement, for if taken at night with a good basin of gruel or tumbler of negus, it sets up a strong perspiration, and the skin, forced into action, may thus regain its tone. However, this is not always successful, unless the sufferer can remain indoors for a few days, and keep a room at an equable temperature of about sixty-five degrees Fahrenheit. Another good remedy—if the patient’s constitution admits of it—is a Turkish bath, where, after an hour in a heat of one hundred and thirty to one hundred and fifty degrees, the tepid douche should be used instead of the cold, because the object in view is not only to open the sweat-pores for a time, but to keep them properly relaxed. Cold water would of course cause them to contract. Perhaps the best, and one of the easiest, is to abstain as much as possible from liquids. By this means the supply of fluid which goes to keep up the running cold is cut off, and with it the discharge. If persevered in for a day, this remedy may completely cure a slight cold, and keep a bad one very much under.