Fortunately graduation soon occurred, and
unintermitted, sustained labor was no longer enforced. The menorrhagia
ceased, but persistent dysmenorrhoea now indicates the neuralgic
friction of an imperfectly developed reproductive apparatus. Doubtless
the evil of her education will infect her whole life.
The next case is drawn from different social surroundings. Early
associations and natural aptitude inclined Miss B---- to the stage;
and the need of bread and butter sent her upon it as a child, at what
age I do not know. At fifteen she was an actress, determined to do her
best, and ambitious of success. She strenuously taxed muscle and
brain at all times in her calling. She worked in a man's sustained
way, ignoring all demands for special development, and essaying first
to dis-establish, and then to bridle, the catamenia. At twenty she was
eminent. The excitement and effort of acting periodically produced the
same result with her that a recitation did under similar conditions
with Miss A----. If she had been a physiologist, she would have known
how this course of action would end. As she was an actress, and not a
physiologist, she persisted in the slow suicide of frequent
hemorrhages, and encouraged them by her method of professional
education, and later by her method of practising her profession.
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