Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 3.djvu/152

142 keeps us from colds helps us to preserve our hearing. We should do, therefore, those things that help to keep colds away: for which the first is taking plenty of fresh air; the second using enough, but not too much, cold water all over us, taking especial care to rub ourselves thoroughly dry, and never to let it chill us; and the third is to avoid draughts, and wet, especially sitting in wet clothes, or being in close or very heated rooms. But there are some kinds of cold especially hurtful to the ear. One is sitting with the ear exposed to a side wind, as too many people do now on the roofs of omnibuses, and so on. We should always face the wind; then, if we are not chilled, it is hard to have too much of it. Another hurtful thing is letting rain or sleet drive into the ear, against which, if it were not that people do sometimes suffer from this cause, it would seem as if it could hardly be necessary to caution them.

Another source of danger to the ear, however, arises from the very precautions which are sometimes taken against those last mentioned. Nothing is more natural than to protect the ear against cold by covering it by a piece of cotton-wool; and this is most useful if it is done only on occasions of special exposure, as when a person is compelled to encounter a driving storm, or has to receive on one side of the head the force of a cutting wind. But it is astonishing in how many cases the cotton-wool thus used, instead of being removed from the ear when the need for it has passed, is pushed down into the passage, and remains there, forming itself an obstruction to hearing, and becoming the cause of other mischiefs. Three separate pieces have sometimes been found thus pushed down, one upon the other. Paper rolled up, which is also used for protecting the ear when cotton-wool is not at hand, is still more irritating when it is thus left unremoved. The way to avoid this accident, besides being careful not to forget, is to use a large piece of wool, and to place it over, rather than in, the passage.

It should be remembered that constantly covering up the ear is adapted to injure it. On the whole, men in whom the ear is habitually exposed, suffer if any thing less from ear-disease than women, in whom it is so often covered. Nor can the "hat" be held an unsafe head-dress in this respect for the latter sex. But it is important that there should not be frequent changes, especially in cold weather, from a head-dress which covers to one which exposes the ear. It is better that the air should always have free access to it; but if this has not been the case, the summer should be chosen to make the change.

All sorts of substances are sometimes put into the ear by children, who do it to themselves or to each other in ignorant play. If every parent and teacher warned his children against doing this, it would not be a useless precaution. When the accident happens, the chief danger is that of undue haste and violence. Such bodies should be removed by syringing with warm water alone, and no attempt should be made to lay hold of them or move them in any other way. It is enough to