| COLORADO FOR INVALIDS. |
By SAMUEL A. FISK, M. D.
THE romantic features of life in the Rocky Mountains have been so gracefully portrayed by such facile pens as those of Bayard Taylor, "H. H.," Miss Bird, and some of our magazine-writers, that the reading public have come to regard this country as adapted either to the tourist, bent on seeking something unusual, looking for novel and startling experiences, or else as an immense treasury of gold and silver, an El Dorado for the miner. But there is a larger class, that portion of our population throughout the East and South suffering from some pulmonary trouble, which should be much more interested in Colorado than either the pleasure-seeker or the money-getter. For such there is a wealth of life stored up in the dry, sunny climate of this State, more precious than the hidden treasures which the mountains contain.
It is the intention of the writer to supplement some past efforts in calling the attention of the public to this salubrious climate, by giving a few details in regard to methods of living, society, resorts, expenses, occupations for the invalid, etc.; and he is led to this by the lack of information that he has found, from a personal experience, exists among Eastern people in regard to these very points, and by the erroneous impressions which he finds most new-comers have as to what they are to expect.
Before entering into these details, it may be well to call attention, very briefly, to the climatic conditions existing in Colorado, which are favorable to the arrest and cure of a large percentage of pulmonary troubles. A careful analysis of Signal-Service statistics for a range of years has shown that the climate of Colorado affords an air 4⁄10 only saturated with moisture, while the air of Jacksonville, Florida, is 7⁄10, and that of Los Angeles, California, is 66⁄100 of saturation; that the average rain and snow-fall, per annum, is only a trifle over fourteen inches, while at Jacksonville it is forty-nine inches, at Los Angeles nineteen inches, and at New York forty-two inches; that the elevation, ranging from five thousand to seven thousand feet, is such as secures the most healthful action for diseased lungs; that the direction and daily motion of the winds are favorable and salubrious; that the mean temperature would place this climate under the head of a "cool climate"; and, lastly, and of the greatest importance, is the fact that it affords an average of three hundred and twenty sunny days per annum, or, to quote the article referred to:[1] "It is seen that in Denver there is only about one eighth of the entire year when an invalid would be kept in the house on account of the weather; in Jacksonville and Au-
- ↑ "Science," vol. ii, No. 35, p. 460.
