[Illustration: THE GIRL’S OWN PAPER] VOL. VIII.—NO. 373.] FEBRUARY 19, 1887. [PRICE ONE PENNY. SPRING: ITS TROUBLES AND DANGERS. BY MEDICUS. [Illustration: A TREACHEROUS SPRING DAY.] _All rights reserved._] Although the subject I have chosen for this month’s paper might seem to some an uninteresting one, I feel I should be casting a slur upon the good sense of the readers of THE GIRL’S OWN if I doubted for a moment their willingness to hear what I have to say. I confess to you, however, that I would far rather discourse to you in pleasant language of perfumes distilled from flowers, of health-giving rambles by moorland, mount, or sea, of the ozone-laden air that gladdens the heart, or the sweet sunshine that warms and thickens the blood, than of rheums and aches and pains. But, was it not Solomon himself who said there is a time for all things? Yes, and the spring months in this country are fraught with a deal of little disagreeablenesses, which prudence and a modicum of care might enable us to avoid. Perhaps the state of the weather to-day may have something to do with the production of this article. My minimum thermometer has been down to 31° during the night, and winter not yet ended. As I write a wild east wind is roaring through the trees, bending the poplars as if they were fishing-rods, tearing the brown leaves from the elms, and whirling them high over the chimneys. Determined not to have fires in my study, I am fain, nevertheless, to envelop myself in my ulster, and thus I sit defiant; the surging, sea-like roar of the storm cannot disturb my equanimity, nor eke the swaying creepers that tap at the windows like dead men’s fingers. Winter will last with us far into April, and on the wings of east winds are borne along many of the seeds of illnesses we would do well to be prepared for.