Читать книгу The Funny Side of Physic - Addison Darre Crabtre - Страница 10

“Augustus Apolphus: I will deceive you no longer. My conscience upbraids me. Those pearly white teeth you so much admire are false! false! They were made by Dr. Grinder, dentist. I use Dr. Scourer’s tooth-paste, which keeps them clean and white. ‘O, how sharper than a serpent’s thanks it is to have a toothless child.’

Susan Jane.”

Great and public men are sometimes induced or inveigled into recommending a patent medicine. In London, one Joshua Ward, a drysalter, of Thames Street, about the year 1780, introduced a pill, composed of the usual ingredients,—aloes and senna,—which, owing to some benefit he was supposed to have derived from their use, Lord Chief Baron Reynolds was led to praise in the highest terms. The result of this high dignitary’s patronage was to give prominence to Ward and his pills, which subsequently sold for the fabulous price of 2s. 6d. a pill! General Churchill added his praise, and Ward was called as a physician to prescribe for the king. Either in consequence, or in spite of the treatment, the royal malady disappeared, and Ward was rewarded with a solemn vote of the House of Commons protecting him from the interdiction of the College of Physicians. In addition to the liberal fee, he asked for and obtained the privilege of driving his carriage through St. James Park! Notwithstanding the pill, Reynolds died of his disease not long afterwards.

Henry Fielding subscribed to the wonderful efficacy of “Tar Water,” a nostrum of his day, but died of the disease for which it was recommended.

Some time prior to 1780 there was published in the newspapers a list of the patent nostrums, or advertised remedies, in London, which numbered upwards of two hundred.

Now there are known, in the United States alone, to be upwards of three hundred differently named hair preparations.

Dr. Head, of whom we have made mention, “realized large sums from worthless quack nostrums,” while at the same time another popular physician, with a Cambridge (England) diploma in his office, was proprietor of a “gout mixture,” which sold at the shops for two shillings a bottle.

Some of these shameless scoundrels, owners of advertised nostrums, with little or no sense of honor, have published the recommendations of great men, without the knowledge or permission of the parties whose names were so falsely affixed to their worthless stuff. A New York quack recently used the name of Henry Ward Beecher in this manner. Mr. Beecher published him as a thief and forger of his name, which only served to bring the doctor (?) into universal notice. Only to-day I read his impudent advertisement in a newspaper, with Mr. Beecher’s name affixed as reference. If you prosecute one of the villains for issuing false certificates, even for forging your own name, it does him no great injury, you get no satisfaction, and in the end it only serves to call public attention to a worthless article, thereby increasing its sale.

In the London Medical Journal of 1806, Dr. Lettsom attacked and exposed a “nervous cordial,” stating that it was a deleterious article; “that it had killed its thousands;” and further asserted that Brodum, its proprietor, was a Jewish knave, having been a bootblack in Copenhagen, and a wholesale murderer. Brodum at once brought an action against the proprietor of the Journal, laying the damages at twenty-five thousand dollars. Brodum held the advantage, and the Journal proprietor asked for terms of settlement. Brodum’s terms were not modest. He, through his attorney, agreed to withdraw the action provided the name of the author was revealed, and that he should whitewash the quack in the next number of the Journal, over the same signature! Dr. Lettsom consented to these terms, paid the lawyers’ bills and costs, amounting to three hundred and ninety pounds, and wrote the required puff of Brodum and his nostrum.

Soothing Syrups, nervous cordials, etc., owe their soothing properties to opium, or its salt—morphine.

From “Opium and the Opium Appetite,” by Alonzo Calkins, M. D., we are informed that an article sold as “Mrs. Winslow’s Soothing Syrup,” for children teething, contains nearly one grain of the alkaloid (morphine) to each ounce of the syrup! Taking one teaspoonful as the dose (that is, one drachm), and there being eight drachms to the ounce, consequently about one eighth of a grain of morphine is given to an infant at a dose! Do you wonder it gives him a quietus? Do you wonder that the mortality among children is greatly on the increase? that so many of the darling, helpless little innocents die from dropsy, brain fever, epileptic fits, and the like?

Fruit Syrups for Soda Water.

Perhaps you take yours “plain.” No! Then you may want to know how the pure fruit syrup, which sweetens and flavors the soda, is made. The “soda” itself is a very harmless article.

Butyric Ether is usually taken for a basis. Butyric ether is manufactured from rancid butter, old rotten cheese, or Limburger cheese. The latter is the “loudest,” and affords the best flavor to the ether. The cheese is treated with sulphuric acid. Old leather is known to give it a particularly fine flavor. Any old boots and shoes will answer.

Pineapple Syrup is made from butyric and formic ether. The latter is manufactured from soap or glycerine. Sulphuric acid and red ants will do as well.

Strawberry is made of twelve parts of butyric ether and one of acetic ether, alcohol, and water. Color with cochineal—a bug of the tick species, from Mexico. Sometimes a little real strawberry is added, but it is not deemed essential.

Raspberry is made from the same articles. If convenient, the druggist adds a little raspberry jam or syrup. If not, color a little deeper, add some strawberry, and change the label to raspberry.

Vanilla Syrup is made of Tonqua beans, such as boys sell on the street.

Peach is made from bitter almonds. Wild Cherry the same.

Nectar is formed by a compound of various syrups and Madeira wine. You can easily make the Madeira of neutral spirits, sugar, raisins, and logwood to color it.

Sarsaparilla. Take the cheapest and nastiest molasses obtainable. Strain it to remove dead bees, sticks, cockroaches, etc. Flavor with essence sassafras and wintergreen. Little extract sarsaparilla will do no harm if added to the mixture. It is very harmless.

Lemon is made of citric acid and sugar.

Coffee is made mostly of chiccory, burnt livers, sometimes a little coffee bean. Horses’ livers are said to be the best, giving it a racy flavor, and more body.

“They are all very good,” the vender tells you; he takes his plain, however. You see how much cheaper these are than the real fruit syrup itself; and as neither you nor I can tell the difference by taste, what inducement has the dealer in soda water to use the costlier articles?

I have a friend who sells the “pure syrups,” and I presume the reader has also; but I respectfully decline drinking soda water with “pure fruit syrups.”

POISONOUS HAIR TONICS AND COSMETICS.

Extract from the report of Professor C. F. Chandler, Ph. D., chemist to the Metropolitan Board of Health. This report, which presents the results of the examination of a few of the articles in general use, was printed in full in the Chemical News (American reprint) for May, 1870. We present the following list of dangerous preparations, which gives the number of grains of lead, etc., in one fluid ounce.

I. Hair Tonics, Washes, and Restoratives.

			Grains of lead in one fluid ounce.
1.	Clark’s Distilled Restorative for the Hair,		0.11
2.	Chevalier’s Life for the Hair,		1.02
3.	Circassian Hair Rejuvenator,		2.71
4.	Ayer’s Hair Vigor,		2.89
5.	Professor Wood’s Hair Restorative,		3.08
6.	Dr. J. J. O’Brien’s Hair Restorer, America,		3.28
7.	Gray’s Celebrated Hair Restorative,		3.39
8.	Phalon’s Vitalia,		4.69
9.	Ring’s Vegetable Ambrosia,		5.00
10.	Mrs. S. A. Allen’s World’s Hair Restorer,		5.57
11.	L. Knittel’s Indian Hair Tonique,		6.29
12.	Hall’s Vegetable Sicilian Hair Renewer,		7.13
13.	Dr. Tebbet’s Physiological Hair Regenerator,		7.44
14.	Martha Washington Hair Restorative,		9.80
15.	Singer’s Hair Restorative,		16.39

II. Lotions or Washes for the Complexion.

Perry’s Moth and Freckle Lotion.

Mercury in solution,	2.67	gr.	}	equiv. to	{	Corrosive Sub.,	3.61	gr.
Zinc in solution,	0.99	"	Sulphate of Zinc,	4.25	"

The sediment contains mercury, lead, and bismuth.

III. Enamels for the Skin.

		Grains of lead in one fluid ounce, after shaking.
Eugenie’s Favorite,		108.94	grains.
Phalon’s Snow-white Enamel,		146.28	"
Phalon’s Snow-white Oriental Cream,		190.99	"

Conclusion.—It appears from the foregoing,—

1. The Hair Tonics, Washes, and Restoratives contain lead in considerable quantities; that they owe their action to this metal, and that they are consequently highly dangerous to the health of persons using them.

2. With a single exception, Perry’s Moth and Freckle Lotion, the Lotions for the skin are free from lead and other injurious metals.

3. That the Enamels are composed of either carbonate of lime, oxide of zinc, or carbonate of lead, suspended in water. The first two classes of enamels are comparatively harmless; as harmless as any other white dirt, when plastered over the skin to close the pores and prevent its healthy action. On the other hand, the enamels composed of carbonate of lead are highly dangerous, and their use is very certain to produce disastrous results to those who patronize them.

Hair Restoratives: A Bald Bachelor’s Experience.

A gentleman of perhaps thirty-five years of age once called upon the writer for advice relative to baldness, when he related the following experience, permitting me to make a note of it at leisure.

“In 1865 my friends intimated to me that my hair was getting slightly thin on the crown of my head. I have always had a mortal terror of being bald, and daily examinations convinced me that my fears were about to be realized. My first inquiry was for a remedy.

“‘What shall I do to prevent its falling out?’ I nervously inquired.

“‘Get a bottle of Dr. ——’s Hair Restorative,’ one advised; another, some different preparation,—all advertised remedies,—till I had a list a yard long of various washes, preventives, restorers, etc., ad infinitum.

“I obtained one of the very best. I used it as directed. It stuck as though its virtue consisted in sticking the loose hairs firmly to the firmer-rooted ones. But alas! after a month’s trial, sufficient hair had come out of my head to make a respectable chignon!

“I next got some of Mrs. A. S. S. Allon’s—or All—something; I forget the rest of the name; I’m sure of the A. S. S., however,—and that was worse than the gum-stick-’em kind, for the hair came out faster than before.

“In despair, I applied to a ‘respectable apothecary,’ who keeps the next corner drug store. ‘For God’s sake, Mr. Bilious, have you got any good preventive for falling of the hair?’ I exclaimed.

“‘O, yes, just the article,’ he replied, rubbing his palms vigorously. He then showed me his stock, consisting of thirty-nine different kinds!

“‘All very good—highly recommended,’ he remarked, with commendable impartiality.

“I selected one—with rather an ominous name, I admit:—Kat-hair-on!—preferring cat’s hair to none.

“I used the Kathairon according to directions.”

“‘Did the cat’s hair grow?’ I anxiously inquired.

“‘Neither cat’s hair nor human hair.’ No. Worse and worse. I was about to abandon all effort, when, stopping on a corner to get a young boot-black to shine my boots, preparatory to making a call on a lady acquaintance, before whom I was desirous of making a genteel appearance, a dirty, ragged little urchin peered around the block, and exclaimed, ‘O, mister, you’re barefooted on top o’ yer head!’ I had inadvertently removed my hat, to wipe my forehead.

“BAREFOOTED ON THE TOP OF HIS HEAD.”

“This was the last feather. Though coming from but a dirty boot-black, it stung me to the marrow. I kicked over the boy, box, blacking, and all, and rushed into the nearest drug shop. I bought another new hair preparation. Another ominous name—‘Bare-it!’

“This I also used, as directed on the label, for a month. ‘I think,’ I said, ‘if I use it a second month, it will entirely bare it!’

“I bought a wig, and had my head shaved. I didn’t lock myself up in a coal-cellar, or hide under a tub, like Diogenes, but I felt that I would have gladly done either, to hide myself from the eyes of the world. The girls all cast shy glances at me as they passed; as though the majority of them did not wear false hair!

“In utter desperation, I visited a dermatologist. What a name to make hair grow! Well, he examined my scalp with a microscope, and said the hair could be made to grow anew. ‘I discover myriads of germs, which only require the right treatment in order to spring up in an exuberant crop of wavy tresses.’ I bought his preparations. Bill, thirty-eight dollars. They were worthless.

“Soon after this failure, I heard of a new remedy—‘a sure cure.’ The proprietor possessed a world-wide reputation, from the manufacture of various other remedies for nearly all diseases to which we poor mortals are subject, and there might be something in this. It was recommended to cure baldness, and restore gray hair to its natural color. I would go and see the proprietor of this excellent hair restorer. I hastened to Lowell. I was ushered into the doctor’s sanctum—into the very presence of this Napoleon of medicine-makers, the Alexander of conquered worlds—of medical prejudices!

“With hat in hand, I bowed low to the great Doctor Hair—or hair doctor. He beheld my veneration for himself. With a practised eye, he noted my genteel apparel. Flattered by my obeisance, and not to be outdone in politeness, he arose, removed his tile, and bowed equally low in return to my profound salutation, when lo! O tempora! O mores! he was both bald and gray! I retired without specifying the object of my visit.”

A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing.

When a man tells you, point blank, that he is selling an article for the profit of it, believe him; but when he asserts that he is advertising and offering a remedy solely for the public good, for the benefit of suffering humanity, he is a liar. Beware of such.

Furthermore, when he publishes an advertisement in every paper in the land, announcing that himself having been miraculously or “providentially” cured of a variety of diseases by a certain compound, the prescription for which he will send free to any address, you should hesitate, until satisfied of the disinterestedness of the party, and meantime ask yourself the following question: “Provided this be true, why don’t the unparalleled benevolent gentleman publish the recipe, which would cost so much less than this persistent advertising ‘that he will send it to any requiring it’? And you are next led to ask,—

“Where is the ‘dodge’? For money is what he is after.”

A reverend (?), a scoundrel, a “wolf in sheep’s clothing,” advertises in nearly every paper you chance to notice, especially religious newspapers, a remedy he discovered while a missionary to some foreign country, that cured him of a variety of diseases, the recipe for which medicine he will send to any address, free of charge.

“Here is the ‘Old Sands of Life’ dodge,” I said, “which I had the satisfaction of exposing fourteen years ago.”

The reader may recollect the advertisement of “A Retired Physician, seventy-five years of age, whose sands of life had nearly run out,” who advertised so extensively a remedy which cured his daughter, etc., which remedy he would send free, to the afflicted, on application.

I investigated his “little fraud.” I found, instead of an old man “seventy-five years of age,” a young man of about twenty-eight or thirty. He was no reverend. He had no daughter. He was a tall, gaunt, profane, tobacco-chewing, foul-mouthed fellow, with a bad impediment in his speech from loss of palate, whose name was Oliver Phipps Brown, a printer by trade, who formerly worked as journeyman in the Courant office, Hartford, Conn. The police finally got hold of him, and broke up the swindle.

OLD “SANDS OF LIFE.”

Here is now a parallel case. The above reverend says he will send the recipe free. I directed my student to write for it. The recipe came, with various articles named therein, supposed to be the Latin names of plants. I assert that there are no such medicines in the Materia Medica, or the world. The reverend don’t want that there should be. Why? Because you would not then send to him for his “Compound.”

He sends with his recipe a circular, in which he gives you the history of his marvellous discovery. Further along, by some oversight, he says it was made known to him through a physician!

The names are bogus. The whole remedy is a humbug. There are names in it as species which sound something like some medical term; and the druggist may be deceived thereby. The reverend quack, foreseeing “the difficulty in obtaining the articles in their purity at any druggist’s,” advises you to send to him for them. Do you begin to see the dodge? He “will furnish it at cost.” Only think! How benevolent! “My means make me independent.” Think again. An invalid from boyhood, his time and means exhausted in travelling “in Europe two years,” and was only “sent a missionary (?) through the kindness of friends,” he assures us in his circular. Here he discovered through an old physician—surely a new mode of discovery—this wonderful compound, which cured him in “six weeks,” and forthwith, in gratitude, he proceeded to New York, and began putting up this marvellous remedy “at cost.”

Let us examine the article sold for three dollars and a half a small package. Dr. Hall, of the “Journal of Health,” examined the article which “Old Sands of Life” sold as Canabis Indica, and found the cost “but sixteen cents, bottle and all.” Nevertheless, “The Retired Physician” sold it to his dupes for two dollars. I do not hesitate to say that the above compound cost even less than sixteen cents a package.

“But,” said a gentleman to me, “he is connected with the Bible House. Here is his address: ‘Station D, Bible House, New York.’”

“There is a post-station by that name. Suppose I should give an address, ‘34 Museum Building.’ Would that imply that I was a play-actor, or owner of the Museum?” I replied.

“Then it is only another ‘Reverend’ dodge—is it?” he asked.

“Precisely; it is to give character to his characterless address.”

“Don’t the newspaper publishers know it is a swindle?” he suggested.

“There’s not the least doubt that they know it.”

“Then hereafter I shall have little faith in the religion or honesty of the newspaper that publishes such swindling advertisements.”

“Admitting that they know the dishonesty of the thing,—and how can any man endowed with common sense but see that there is swindle on the face of it?—the publisher of that advertisement is a particeps criminis in the transaction.”

“Why don’t some of the thousand victims who have been swindled into buying this worthless stuff expose him?”

“In exposing the reverend wolf, don’t you see they would expose their own weakness? This is the reason of the fellow’s selecting the peculiar class of diseases as curable by his great discovery. The poor sufferer does not wish the community to know that he is afflicted by such a disease.”

“It is truly a great dodge; and no doubt the knave has found fools enough to make him ‘independent.’”

Rules. 1. Take no patent or advertised medicines at all. They are of no earthly use! You never require them, as they are not conducive to your health, happiness, or longevity.

There are physicians who can cure every disease that flesh is heir to—excepting one.

2. Apply in your need only to a respectable physician.

3. Give your preference to such as administer the smallest quantities of medicine—and are successful in their practice.

I have barely begun to exhaust the material I have been years collecting for this chapter; but I must desist, to give room for other important expositions.