{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_39514/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_39514","id":"gutenberg_39514","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/39514","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Archaeology & Anthropology","Category: Health & Medicine","Category: History - Other","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Literature and medicine","Physicians","Physicians in literature"],"text":"Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at\nhttp://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images\ngenerously made available by The Internet Archive.)\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE DOCTOR.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: HENRY VIII. RECEIVING THE BARBER-SURGEONS.]\n\n\n\n\n  THE DOCTOR IN HISTORY,\n  LITERATURE, FOLK-LORE, ETC.\n\n\n  EDITED BY\n  WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S.,\n  AUTHOR OF \"BYGONE ENGLAND,\"\n  \"OLD CHURCH LORE,\" ETC.\n\n\n  HULL:\n  WILLIAM ANDREWS & CO., THE HULL PRESS.\n  LONDON:\n  SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT, & CO., LTD.\n\n  1896.\n\n\n\n\nPreface.\n\n\nIn the following pages I have attempted to bring together from the pens of\nseveral authors who have written expressly for this book, the more\ninteresting phases of the history, literature, folk-lore, etc., of the\nmedical profession.\n\nIf the same welcome be given to this work as was accorded to those I have\npreviously produced, my labours will not have been in vain.\n\nWILLIAM ANDREWS.\n\n  THE HULL PRESS,\n    HULL, _November 11th, 1895_.\n\n\n\n\nContents.\n\n\n  BARBER-SURGEONS. By William Andrews, F.R.H.S.                    1\n\n  TOUCHING FOR THE KING'S EVIL. By William Andrews, F.R.H.S.       8\n\n  VISITING PATIENTS                                               22\n\n  ASSAYING MEAT AND DRINK. By William Andrews, F.R.H.S.           24\n\n  THE GOLD-HEADED CANE. By Tom Robinson, M.D.                     32\n\n  MAGIC AND MEDICINE. By Cuming Walters                           42\n\n  CHAUCER'S DOCTOR OF PHYSIC. By W. H. Thompson                   70\n\n  THE DOCTORS SHAKESPEARE KNEW. By A. H. Wall                     76\n\n  DICKENS' DOCTORS. By Thomas Frost                               90\n\n  FAMOUS LITERARY DOCTORS. By Cuming Walters                     102\n\n  THE \"DOCTOR\" IN TIME OF PESTILENCE. By William E. A.\n  Axon, F.R.S.L.                                                 125\n\n  MOUNTEBANKS AND MEDICINE. By Thomas Frost                      140\n\n  THE STRANGE STORY OF THE FIGHT WITH THE SMALL-POX.\n  By Thomas Frost                                                153\n\n  BURKERS AND BODY-SNATCHERS. By Thomas Frost                    167\n\n  REMINISCENCES OF THE CHOLERA. By Thomas Frost                  181\n\n  SOME OLD DOCTORS. By Mrs. G. Linnaeus Banks                     192\n\n  THE LEE PENNY                                                  209\n\n  HOW OUR FATHERS WERE PHYSICKED. By J. A. Langford, LL.D.       216\n\n  MEDICAL FOLK-LORE. By John Nicholson                           234\n\n  OF PHYSICIANS AND THEIR FEES, with some Personal\n  Reminiscences. By Andrew James Symington, F.R.S.N.A.           252\n\n  INDEX                                                          285\n\n\n\n\nTHE DOCTOR IN HISTORY, LITERATURE, AND FOLK-LORE.\n\n\n\n\nBarber-Surgeons.\n\nBY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S.\n\n\nThe calling of the barber is of great antiquity. We find in the Book of\nthe Prophet Ezekiel (v. 1) allusions to the Jewish custom of the barber\nshaving the head as a sign of mourning.\n\nIn the remote past the art of surgery and the trade of barber were\ncombined. It is clear that in all parts of the civilized world, in bygone\ntimes, the barber acted as a kind of surgeon, or to state his position\nmore precisely, he practised phlebotomy.\n\nBarbers appear to have gained their experience from the monks whom they\nassisted in surgical operations. The clergy up to about the twelfth\ncentury had the care of men's bodies as well as of their souls, and\npractised surgery and medicine. The operations of surgery involved the\nshedding of blood, and it was felt that this was incompatible with the\nfunctions of the clergy. After much consideration and discussion, in 1163\nthe council of Tours, under Pope Alexander III., forbade the clergy to act\nas surgeons, but they were permitted to dispense medicine.\n\nThe edict of Tours must have given satisfaction to the barbers, and they\nwere not slow to avail themselves of the opportunities the change afforded\nthem. In London, and we presume in other places, the barbers advertised\ntheir blood-letting in a most objectionable manner. It was customary to\nput blood in their windows to attract the attention of the public. An\nordinance was passed in 1307, directing the barbers to have the blood\n\"privily carried into the Thames under pain of paying two shillings to the\nuse of the Sheriffs.\"\n\nAt an early period in London the barbers were banded together, and a gild\nwas formed. In the first instance it seems that the chief object was the\nbringing together of the members at religious observances. They attended\nthe funerals and obits of deceased members and their wives. Eventually it\nwas transformed into a semi-social and religious gild, and subsequently\nbecame a trade gild.\n\nIn 1308, Richard le Barber, the first master of the Barbers' Company, was\nsworn at the Guildhall, London. As time progressed, the London Company of\nBarbers increased in importance.\n\nIn the first year of the reign of Edward IV. (1462) the barbers were\nincorporated by a royal charter, and it was confirmed by succeeding\nmonarchs.\n\nA change of title occurred in 1540, and it was then named the Company of\nBarber-Surgeons. Holbein painted a picture of Henry VIII. and the\nBarber-Surgeons. The painting is still preserved, and may be seen at the\nBarber-Surgeons' Hall, Monkwell Street, London. We give a carefully\nexecuted wood engraving of the celebrated picture. Pepys calls this \"not a\npleasant though a good picture.\" It is the largest and last painting of\nHolbein. In the _Leisure Hour_ for September 1895, are some interesting\ndetails respecting it, that are well worth reproducing. \"It is painted,\"\nwe are told, \"on vertical oak boards, being 5ft. 11in. high by 10ft. 2in.\nlong. It seems to have been begun about 1541, and finished after\nHolbein's death in 1543, and it has evidently been altered since its first\ndelivery. The tablet, for instance, was not always in the background, for\nthe old engraving in the College of Surgeons has a window in its place,\nshowing the old tower of St. Bride's, and thus indicating Bridewell as the\nsite of the ceremony. The outermost figure to the left, too, is omitted,\nand, according to some critics, the back row of heads are all\npost-Holbeinic. The names over the heads appear to have been added in\nCharles I.'s time, and it is significant that only two portraits in the\nback row are so distinguished.\" The king is represented wearing his robes,\nand is seated on a chair of state, holding erect his sword of state, and\nabout him are the leading members of the fraternity. \"The men whose\nportraits appear in the picture,\" says the _Leisure Hour_, \"are not\nnonentities. The first figure to the king's right, with his hands in his\ngown, is Dr. John Chambre, king's physician, Fellow and Warden of Merton,\nand happy in his multitudinous appointments, both clerical and lay. Behind\nhim is the Doctor Butts of Shakespeare's 'Henry VIII.'--the Sir William\nButts who was the king's and Princess Mary's physician, and whose wife is\nknown by Holbein's splendid portrait of her. Behind Butts is Alsop, the\nking's apothecary. To the king's left the first figure is Thomas Vicary,\nsurgeon to Bartholomew's Hospital, serjeant-surgeon to the king, and\nauthor of 'The Anatomie of the Bodie of Man.' Next to him is Sir John\nAyleff, an exceptionally good portrait. Then come in the undernamed:\nNicholas Simpson, Edmund Harman (one of the witnesses to the king's will),\nJames Monforde (who gave the company the silver hammer still used by the\nMaster in presiding at the courts), John Pen (another fine portrait),\nNicholas Alcocke, and Richard Ferris (also serjeant-surgeon to the king).\nIn the back row the only names given are those of Christopher Salmond and\nWilliam Tilley.\"\n\nIn the reign of Henry VIII. an enactment as follows was in force:--\"No\nperson using any shaving or barbery in London shall occupy any surgery,\nletting of blood, or other matter, except of drawing teeth.\" Laws were\nmade, but they could not be, or at all events were not, enforced. Disputes\nwere frequent. The barbers acted often as surgeons, and the surgeons\nincreased their income by the use of the razor and shears. At this period\nvigorous attempts were made to confine each to their legitimate work.\n\nThe barber's pole, it is said, owes its origin to the barber-surgeons.\nMuch has been written on this topic, but we believe that the following are\nthe facts of the matter. We know that in the days of old bleeding was a\nfrequent occurrence, and during the operation the patient used to grasp a\nstaff, stick, or pole which the barber-surgeon kept ready for use, and\nround it was bound a supply of bandages for tying the arm of the patient.\nThe pole, when not in use, was hung at the door as a sign. In course of\ntime a painted pole was displayed instead of that used in the operation.\n\nLord Thurlow addressing the House of Lords, July 17th, 1797, stated, \"by a\nstatute, still in force, barbers and surgeons were each to use a pole [as\na sign]. The barbers were to have theirs blue and white, striped, with no\nother appendage; but the surgeons', which was to be the same in other\nrespects, was likewise to have a gully-pot and a red rag, to denote the\nparticular nature of their vocations.\"\n\nThe Rev. J. L. Saywell has a note on bleeding in his \"History and Annals\nof Northallerton\" (1885):--\"Towards the early part of this century,\"\nobserves Mr. Saywell, \"a singular custom prevailed in the town and\nneighbourhood of Northallerton (Yorkshire). In the spring of the year\nnearly all the robust male adults, and occasionally females, repaired to a\nsurgeon to be bled, a process which they considered essentially conduced\nto vigorous health.\" The charge for the operation was one shilling.\n\nParliament was petitioned, in 1542, praying that surgeons might be exempt\nfrom bearing arms and serving on juries, and thus be enabled without\nhindrance to attend to their professional duties. The request was granted,\nand to the present time medical men enjoy the privileges granted so long\nago.\n\nIn 1745, the surgeons and the barbers separated by Act of Parliament. The\nbarber-surgeons lingered for a long time, the last in London, named\nMiddleditch, of Great Suffolk Street, in the Borough, only dying in 1821.\nMr. John Timbs, the popular writer, left on record that he had a vivid\nrecollection of Middleditch's dentistry.\n\n\n\n\nTouching for the King's Evil.\n\nBY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S.\n\n\nThe practice of touching for the cure of scrofula--a disease more\ngenerally known as king's evil--prevailed for a long period in England.\nEdward the Confessor who reigned from 1042 to 1066, appears to be the\nfirst monarch in this country who employed this singular mode of\ntreatment.\n\nAbout a century after the death of Edward the Confessor, William of\nMalmesbury compiled his \"Chronicle of the Kings of England,\" and in this\nwork is the earliest allusion to the subject. Holinshed has placed on\nrecord some interesting details respecting Edward the Confessor. \"As it\nhas been thought,\" says Holinshed, in writing of the king, \"he was\ninspired with the gift of prophecy, and also to have the gift of healing\ninfirmities and disease commonly called the king's evil, and left that\nvirtue, as it were, a portion of inheritance to his successors, the kings\nof this realm.\" The first edition of the \"Chronicle\" was published in\n1577, and from it Shakespeare drew much material for his historical\ndramas. There is an allusion to this singular superstition in _Macbeth_,\nwhich it will be interesting to reproduce.\n\nMalcolm and Macduff are in England, \"in a room in the King's palace\" (the\npalace of King Edward the Confessor):--\n\n    \"_Malcolm._ Comes the King forth I pray you?\n\n    _Doctor._   Aye, sir! There are a crew of wretched souls\n                That stay his cure: their malady convinces\n                The great assay of art; but at his touch--\n                Such sanctity hath heaven given his hand--\n                They presently amend.\n\n    _Malcolm._ I thank you, Doctor.\n\n    _Macduff._ What's the disease he means?\n\n    _Malcolm._ 'Tis called the evil:\n                A most miraculous work in this good King;\n                Which often, since my here-remain in England,\n                I've seen him do. How he solicits heaven,\n                Himself best knows: but strangely visited people\n                All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,\n                The mere despair of surgery, he cures,\n                Hanging a golden stamp about their necks,\n                Put on with holy prayers: and 'tis spoken,\n                To the succeeding royalty he leaves\n                The healing benediction. With this strange virtue,\n                He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy,\n                And sundry blessings hang about his throne\n                That speak him full of grace.\"\n\nHistory does not furnish any facts respecting touching by the four kings\nof the House of Normandy. It is generally believed that the Norman\nmonarchs did not practise the rite.\n\nHenry II., the first of the Plantagenet line, emulated the Confessor. We\nknow this fact from a record made by Peter of Blois, the royal chaplain,\nin which it is clearly stated that the king performed certain cures by\ntouch. John of Gaddesden, in the days of Edward II., wrote a treatise in\nwhich he gave instructions for several modes of treatment for the disease,\nand if they failed, recommended the sufferers to seek cure by royal touch.\nBradwardine, Archbishop of Canterbury, lived in the reigns of Edward III.\nand Richard II., and from his statements we learn that both kings kept up\nthe observance.\n\nHenry IV., the first king of the House of Lancaster, touched for the evil.\nThis we learn from a \"Defence to the title of House of Lancaster,\" written\nby Sir John Fortesque, Lord Chief Justice of the Court of King's Bench. He\nspeaks of the practice as \"belonging to the kings of England from time\nimmemorial.\" This pamphlet is preserved among the Cottonian manuscripts in\nthe British Museum.\n\nThe earliest king of the House of Tudor, Henry VII., was the first to give\na small gold piece, known as a touch-piece, to those undergoing the\nceremony.\n\nDuring the reign of the next monarch, Henry VIII., little attention\nappears to have been given to the subject. It was at this period largely\npractised in France. Cardinal Wolsey, when at the Court of Francis I., in\n1527, witnessed the king touch two hundred people. On Easter Sunday, 1686,\nLouis XIV. is recorded to have touched 1,600. He used these words:--\"_Le\nRoy te touche, Dieu te gueisse._\" (\"The King touches thee. May God cure\nthee!\")\n\nComing back to the history of our own country, and dealing with the more\ninteresting passages bearing on this theme, we find that in the reign of\nQueen Elizabeth, William Clowes, the Court Surgeon, believed firmly in the\nefficacy of the royal touch. \"The king's queen's evil,\" he says, \"is a\ndisease repugnant to nature, which grievous malady is known to be\nmiraculously cured and healed by the sacred hands of the Queen's most\nRoyal Majesty, even by Divine inspiration and wonderful work and power of\nGod, above man's will, act, and expectation.\" In this reign, under the\ntitle of \"_Charisma; sive Donum Sanationis_,\" a book was published by\nWilliam Fookes bearing testimony to the cures effected by royal touch on\nall sorts and conditions of people from various parts of the country.\n\nThe Stuarts paid particular attention to the practice. No fewer than\neleven proclamations published during the reign of Charles I. are\npreserved at the State Paper Office, and chiefly relate to the times the\nafflicted might attend the court to receive the royal touch. In course of\ntime the king's pecuniary means became limited, and he was unable to\npresent gold touch-pieces, so silver was substituted, and many received\nthe rite of touch only.\n\nDuring the Commonwealth we have not any trace of Cromwell touching for the\nmalady. During the rising in the West of England, the Duke of Monmouth,\nwho claimed to be the rightful heir to the throne, touched several persons\nfor the evil, and, said a newspaper of the time, with success. One of the\ncharges made against him on his trial at Edinburgh for high treason, was,\nthat he had \"touched children of the King's Evil.\" Two witnesses proved\nthe charge, having witnessed the ceremony at Taunton.\n\nNo sooner had another Stuart obtained the English crown than the ceremony\nwas again performed. During the first year of the reign of Charles II.,\nsix thousand seven hundred and twenty-five persons were brought to His\nMajesty to be healed. The ceremony was often performed on a Sunday. Evelyn\nand Pepys were witnesses of these proceedings, and in their Diaries have\nrecorded interesting particulars. Under date of 6th July, 1660, \"His\nMajesty,\" writes Evelyn, \"began first to touch for ye evil, according to\ncustome thus: Sitting under his state in the Banqueting House, the\nchirurgeons cause the sick to be brought or led up to the throne, where,\nthey kneeling, ye king strokes their faces and cheeks with both his hands\nat once, at which instant a chaplaine in his fermalities says:--'He put\nhis hands upon them and healed them.' This he said to every one in\nparticular. When they have been all totched, they come up again in the\nsame order; and the other chaplaine kneeling, and having an angel of gold\nstrung on white ribbon on his arme, delivers them one by one to His\nMajestie, who puts them about the necks of the touched as they passe,\nwhile the first chaplaine repeats 'That is ye true light which came into\nye world.' Then follows an epistle (as at first a gospel) with the\nliturgy, prayers for the sick, with some alteration, and then the Lord\nChamberlain and the Comptroller of the Household bring a basin, ewer, and\ntowel, for his Majesty to wash.\"\n\nSamuel Pepys witnessed the ceremony on April 13th, 1661, and refers to it\nin his Diary. \"Went to the Banquet House, and there saw the King heal, the\nfirst time I ever saw him do it, which he did with great gravity, and it\nseemed to me to be an ugly office and a simple one.\"\n\nIn Evelyn's Diary on March 28th, 1684, there is a record of a serious\naccident, \"There was,\" he writes, \"so great a concourse of people with\ntheir children to be touched for the evil, that six or seven were crushed\nto death by pressing at the chirurgeon's door for tickets.\"\n\nAccording to Macaulay, Charles II. during his reign touched nearly a\nhundred thousand persons. In the year 1682 he performed the rite eight\nthousand five hundred times.\n\nNo person was allowed to enter the King's presence for the purpose of\nreceiving the rite without first obtaining a certificate from the minister\nof his parish from whence he came, nor unless he had not previously been\ntouched. A proclamation of Charles II., dated January 9th, 1683, ordered a\nregister of the certificates to be made. Here is a record drawn from the\nOld Town's Book of Birmingham:--\n\n    \"March 14th, 1683, Elizabeth, daughter of John and Anne Dickens, of\n    Birmingham, in the county of Warwick, was certified for in order to\n    obtayne his Majesty's touch for her cure.\n\n      HENRY GROVE, Minister.\n      JOHN BIRCH,  }\n      HENRY PATER, }  Churchwardens.\"\n\nWe cull from the churchwardens' accounts of Terling, Essex, the following\nitem:--\n\n    \"1683 Dec{r}. Pd. for his Majestie's order for touching 00.00.06.\"\n\nA page in the register book of Bisley, Surrey, is headed thus,\n\"Certificates for the Evill commonly called the kings Evill.\" Two entries\noccur as follow:--\n\n    \"Elizabeth Collier and Thomas Collier the children of Thomas Collier,\n    Senior, had a certificate from the minister and churchwardens of\n    Bisley, August 7th 1686.\"\n\n    \"Sarah Massey, the daughter of Richard Massey, had a certificate from\n    the minister and churchwardens of Bisley, 1st April 1688.\"\n\nOld parish accounts often contain entries similar to the following, from\nEcclesfield, Yorkshire:--\n\n    \"1641. Given to John Parkin wife towards her\n           trauell to London to get cure of his Matie.\n           for the disease called Euill which her\n           soone Thom is visited withall              0. 6. 8.\"\n\n\"The following extracts,\" says a contributor to _The Reliquary_ of\nJanuary, 1894, \"from the Minute Books of the Corporation of the city of\nYork, show that general belief in the virtue of the touching by the King\nwas unshaken at the end of the seventeenth century. It must be borne in\nmind that these Minutes do not record the acts of individuals, but were\nthose of the Corporation of what was at that time one of the most\nimportant cities in the country, and that it was in administering Poor Law\nRelief that the grants were made.\n\nIn Vol. 38 of the Corporation Records, fo. 74b, under the date of February\n28th, 1671, is the following:--\n\n    \"Ordered that Elizabeth Trevis haue x{s} given her for charges in\n    carrying her daughter to London to be touched for the Evill.\"\n\nA few years later, on March 12th, 1678 (fo. 156b), occurs the\nfollowing:--\n\n    \"Anne Thornton to haue x{s} for goeing to London to be touched for the\n    euill.\"\n\nAnd again on March 3, 1687 (fo. 249b), ten shillings was granted for\n\"carrying of Judith Gibbons & her Child & one Dorothy Browne to London to\nbe touched by his Majestie in order to be healed of the Kings Evil.\"\n\nThe Records of the Corporation of Preston, Lancashire, contain at least\ntwo references to this matter. In the year 1682 the bailiffs were\ninstructed to \"pay unto James Harrison, bricklayer, 10s. towards carrying\nhis son to London, in order to the procuring of His Majesty's touch.\"\n\nFive years later, when James II. was at Chester, the council passed a vote\nthat \"the Bailiff pay unto the persons undermentioned each of them 5s.\ntowards their charge in going to Chester to get his Majesty's\ntouch:--Anne, daughter of Abel Mope; ---- daughter Richard Letmore.\"\n\nIt is recorded that James II. touched eight hundred persons in the choir\nof the Cathedral of Chester.\n\nThe ceremony cost, we learn from Macaulay, about L10,000 a year, and the\namount would have been much greater but for the vigilance of the royal\nsurgeons, whose business it was to examine the applicants, and to\ndistinguish those who came for the cure, and those who came for the gold.\n\nWilliam III. declined to have anything to do with a ceremony he regarded\nas an imposture. \"It is a silly superstition,\" he said, when he heard that\nat the close of Lent his palace was besieged by a crowd of sick. \"Give the\npoor creatures some money, and send them away.\" On one occasion only was\nhe induced to lay his hand on a sufferer. \"God give you better health,\" he\nsaid, \"and more sense.\"\n\nThe next to wear the crown was Queen Anne, and she revived the rite. In\nthe _London Gazette_ of March 12th, 1712, appeared an official\nannouncement that the queen intended to touch for the evil. In Lent of\nthat year, Dr. Johnson, then a child, went up to London with his mother in\nthe stage coach that he might have the benefit of the royal touch. He was\nthen between two and three years of age. \"His mother,\" writes Boswell,\n\"yielding to the superstitious notion which, it is wonderful to think,\nprevailed so long in this country as to the virtue of regal touch (a\nnotion to which a man of such inquiry and such judgment as Carte, the\nhistorian, could give credit), carried him to London, where he was\nactually touched by Queen Anne. Mrs. Johnson, indeed, as Mr. Hector\ninformed me, acted by the advice of the celebrated Sir John Floyer, then a\nphysician in Lichfield. Johnson used to talk of this very frankly, and\nMrs. Piozzi has preserved his very picturesque description of the scene as\nit remained upon his fancy. Being asked if he could remember Queen Anne,\n'He had,' he said, 'a confused but somehow a sort of solemn recollection\nof a lady in diamonds and a long black hood.' This touch, however, was\nwithout any effect.\" The malady remained with Dr. Johnson to his death.\n\n[Illustration: TOUCH-PIECE OF CHARLES II. (GOLD).]\n\nAfter the death of Queen Anne, no other English sovereign kept up the\ncustom, although the service remained in the \"Book of Common Prayer\" as\nlate as 1719.\n\nThe latest instance we have found of the ceremony being performed was in\nOctober, 1745, when Charles Edward, at Holyrood House, touched a child.\n\n[Illustration: (GOLD). TOUCH-PIECES OF JAMES II. (SILVER).]\n\nIn the preceding pages we have referred to \"touch pieces,\" and it will not\nbe without interest to direct attention to some of the more notable\nexamples. A small sum of money was given by Edward I., and it has been\nsuggested that it was probably presented in the form of alms. Henry VII.\ngave a small gold coin known as the angel noble. It was of about six\nshillings and eight pence in value, and was a current coin of the period,\nand the smallest gold coin issued. On one side of the coin was a figure of\nthe angel Michael overcoming the dragon, and on the other a ship on the\nwaves. During the residence of Charles II. on the continent, those who\nvisited him to receive the royal rite had to give him gold, but after the\nRestoration, \"touch-pieces\" were made expressly for presentation at the\nhealings. They were small gold medals resembling angels, but they were not\nequal in value to the angels previously given. However they met a want\nwhen gold was in great demand. James II. had two kinds of touch pieces,\none of gold and the other of silver, but they were not half the size of\nthose given by Charles II. Queen Anne gave a touch-piece a little larger\nthan that of James II. The touch-piece presented by this Queen to Dr.\nJohnson may, with other specimens, be seen in the British Museum.\n\n[Illustration: TOUCH-PIECE OF ANNE (GOLD).]\n\nIn a carefully-compiled article in the _Archaeological Journal_, vol. x.,\np. 187-211, will be found some interesting particulars of touch-pieces,\nand to it we are indebted for the few details we have given bearing on\nthis part of our subject.\n\n\n\n\nVisiting Patients.\n\n\nThe doctor made his daily rounds, before the reign of Charles II., on\nhorseback, sitting sideways on foot-clothes. He must have cut an\nundignified figure as he rode through the streets of London and our chief\ntowns.\n\nA change came after the Restoration, and we meet with the physicians\nmaking their visits in a carriage and pair. It seems that increased fees\nwere expected with the introduction of the carriage. A curious note\nappears on this subject in _Lex Talionis_. \"For there must now be a little\ncoach and two horses,\" says the author, \"and, being thus attended,\nhalf-a-piece their usual fee is but ill taken, and popped into their left\npocket, and possibly may cause the patient to send for his worship twice\nbefore he will come again in the hazard of another angel.\" The carriage\nwas popular, and physicians vied with each other in making the greatest\ndisplay.\n\nIn the days of Queen Anne, a doctor would even drive half-a-dozen horses\nattached to his chariot, and not fewer than four was the general rule.\n\nIn our own time the doctor's carriage and pair is to be seen in all\ndirections. It is now driven for use and not for display as in the days of\nQueen Anne.\n\nWe have seen the bicycle used by doctors of good standing, and we predict\nthe time is not far distant when it will be more generally ridden by\nmembers of the medical profession.\n\n\n\n\nAssaying Meat and Drink.\n\nBY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S.\n\n\nFrom the time of our earliest Norman king down to the days of James I.,\nthe chief people of the land partook of their food in fear. Treachery was\na not infrequent occurrence, and poison was much used as a means of taking\nlife. As a precaution against murder, assayers of food, drink, etc., were\nappointed. Doctors usually filled the office, and by their unremitting\nattention to their duties crime was to a great extent prevented. In a\nroyal household the physician acted as assayer.\n\nLet us imagine ourselves in an old English home, the palace of a king, or\nthe stronghold of a leading nobleman. The cloth is laid by subordinate\nservants, but not without considerable ceremony. Next a chief officer of\nthe household sees that every article on the table is free from poison.\nThe bread about to be consumed is cut, and, in the presence of the \"taker\nof assay,\" is tasted, and the salt is also tested. The knives, spoons,\nand table linen are kissed by a responsible person, so that assurance\nmight be given that they were free from poison. Then the salt dish is\ncovered with a lid, and the bread is wrapped in a napkin, and afterwards\nthe whole table is covered with a fair white cloth. The coverlet remains\nuntil the head of the household comes to take his repast, and then his\nchief servant removes the covering of the table. If any person attempted\nto touch the covered bread or the covered salt after the spreading of the\ncoverlet, they ran the risk of a severe flogging, and sometimes even death\nat the hands of a hangman.\n\nThe time of bringing up the meats having arrived, the assayer proceeds to\nthe kitchen, and tests the loyalty of the steward and cook by compelling\nthem to partake of small quantities of the food prepared before it is\ntaken to the table. Pieces of bread were cut and dipped into every mess,\nand were afterwards eaten by cook and steward. The crusts of closed pies\nwere raised, and the contents tasted; small pieces of the more substantial\nviands were tasted, and not a single article of food was suffered to leave\nthe kitchen without being assayed. After the ceremony had been completed,\neach dish was covered, no matter if hot or cold, and these were taken by\nservitors to the banqueting hall, a marshal with wand of office preceding\nthe procession. The bearers on no account were permitted to linger on the\nway, no matter if their hands were burnt they must bear the pain, far\nbetter to suffer that than be suspected of tampering with the food. On no\npretext were the covers to be removed until the proper time, and by the\nservants appointed for that purpose. If very hot, the bearers might\nperhaps protect their hands with bread, which was to be kept out of sight.\n\nWe produce from the Rev. Charles Bullock's interesting volume entitled\n\"How they Lived in the Olden Time,\" a picture of bringing in the dinner.\nIt will be observed that the steward, bearing his staff of office, heads\nthe procession.\n\nEach dish as it was brought to the table was again tasted in the presence\nof the personage who purposed partaking of it. This entailed considerable\nceremony, and took up much time. To render the delay as little unpleasant\nas possible to the guests, music was usually performed.\n\n[Illustration: BRINGING IN THE DINNER.]\n\nIn the stately homes of old England, as a mark of respect to the\ndistinguished visitor, it was customary to assign to him an assayer.\nHistory furnishes a notable instance of an omission of the official. When\nRichard II. was at Pontefract Castle, we gather from _Hall's Chronicle_,\nedition 1548, folio 14, that Sir Piers Exton intended poisoning the King,\nand, to use the chronicler's words, forbade the \"esquire whiche was\naccustumed to serve and take the assaye beefore Kyng Richarde, to again\nuse that manner of service.\" According to Hall, the King \"sat downe to\ndyner, and was served withoute curtesie or assaye; he much mervaylyng at\nthe sodayne mutacion of the thynge, demanded of the esquire why he did not\ndo his duty.\" He replied that Sir Piers had forbidden him performing the\nduties pertaining to his position. The King immediately picked up a\ncarving-knife, struck upon the head of the assayer, and exclaimed, \"The\ndevil take Henry of Lancaster and thee together.\"\n\nPaul Hentzner, a German tutor, visited England in 1598, and wrote a\ngraphic account of his travels in the country, which were translated into\nEnglish by Horace Walpole. The work contains a curious account of the\nceremonies of laying the cloth, etc., for Queen Elizabeth at Greenwich\nPalace. The notice is rather long, but is so entertaining and informing\nthat it well merits reproduction. \"A gentleman,\" it is stated, \"entered\nthe room bearing a rod, and along with him another who had a table-cloth,\nwhich, after they had both kneeled three times, with the utmost\nveneration, he spread upon the table, and after kneeling again, they both\nretired. Then came two others, one with the rod again, and the other with\na salt-cellar and a plate of bread: when they had kneeled, as the others\nhad done, and placed what was brought upon the table, they, too, retired\nwith the same ceremonies performed by the first. At last came an unmarried\nlady (we were told she was a Countess), and along with her a married one,\nbearing a tasting-knife; the former was dressed in white silk, who when\nshe prostrated herself three times in the most graceful manner, approached\nthe table, and rubbed the plates with bread and salt with as much care as\nif the Queen had been present; when they had waited there a little time,\nthe Yeomen of the Guard entered bareheaded, clothed in scarlet, with a\ngolden rose upon their backs, bringing in at each turn a course of\ntwenty-four dishes, served in plate, most of it gilt; these dishes were\nreceived by a gentleman in the same order they were brought, and placed\nupon the table, while the lady-taster gave to each guard a mouthful to\neat, for fear of poison. During the time that this guard, which consists\nof the tallest and stoutest men that can be found in all England, being\ncarefully selected for this service, were bringing dinner, twelve trumpets\nand two kettle-drums made the hall ring for half-an-hour together. At the\nend of the ceremonial, a number of unmarried ladies appeared, who, with\nparticular solemnity, lifted the meat off the table and conveyed it into\nthe Queen's inner and more private chamber, where, after she had chosen\nfor herself, the rest goes to the ladies of the Court.\"\n\n[Illustration: ASSAYING WINE.]\n\nDrink as well as food had to be assayed twice, once in the buttery and\nagain in the hall. The butler drank of the wine in the buttery, and then\nhanded it to the cup-bearer in a covered vessel. When he arrived at the\nhall, he removed the lid of the cup, and poured into the inverted cover a\nlittle of the wine, and drank it under the eye of his master. We give an\nillustration, reproduced from an ancient manuscript, of an assayer tasting\nwine. The middle of the twelfth century is most probably the period\nrepresented.\n\nIn the ancient assay cup, it is related on reliable authority, a charm was\nattached to a chain of gold, or embedded in the bottom of the vessel.\nThis was generally a valuable carbuncle or a piece of tusk of a narwhal,\nusually regarded as the horn of the unicorn, and which was believed to\nhave the power of neutralising or even detecting the presence of poison.\n\nEdward IV. presented to the ambassadors of Charles of Burgundy a costly\nassay cup of gold, ornamented with pearls and a great sapphire, and, to\nuse the words of an old writer, \"in the myddes of the cuppe ys a grete\npece of a Vnicornes horne.\"\n\nThe water used for washing the hands of the great had to be tasted by the\nyeoman who placed it on the table, to prove that no poison was contained\nin the fluid. This ceremony had to be performed in the presence of an\nassayer.\n\n\n\n\nThe Gold-headed Cane.\n\nBY TOM ROBINSON, M.D.\n\n\nThe stick takes many forms. It is the sceptre of kings, the club of a\npolice constable, the baton of a field marshal. The mace is but a stick of\noffice, being ornamental and merely symbolical.\n\nIn history we may go back to the pilgrim's staff, which was four feet\nlong, and hollow at the top to carry away relics from the Holy Land. It\nwas also used to carry contraband goods, such as seeds, or silk-worms'\neggs, which the Chinese, Turks, or Greeks forbade to be exported. It is\noccasionally used for eluding the customs now. Some people smuggle\ndiamonds into the United States in that way.\n\nPrometheus' reed, or marthex, in which he conveyed fire to \"wretched\nmortals,\" as Aeschylus tells us, is a well-known fable.\n\nAn enormous amount of interest centres around the walking stick, and there\nare few families in which we do not find an old stick handed down\ngeneration after generation. Such an inheritance was at one time a common\npossession of those who belonged to the medical profession.\n\n[Illustration: DR. RADCLIFFE'S CANE.]\n\nThe College of Physicians possesses at the present time the gold cane\nwhich Radcliffe, Mead, Askew, Pitcairn, and Baillie successively carried\nabout with them, and which Mrs. Baillie presented to that learned body.\nThe drawing here given is a representation of this cane, and it will be\nseen that it has not a gold knob, but consists of an engraved handle or\ncrook. It is, I think, quite clear that the custom which the doctors of\nthe last century always followed in carrying their stick about with them,\neven to the bed-side, was due entirely to the fact that the handle of the\ncane could be, and was, filled with strong smelling disinfectants, such as\nrosemary and camphor. The doctor held this against his nose obviously for\ntwo reasons. One, to destroy any poison which might be floating about in\nthe air but chiefly to prevent him smelling unpleasant odours. This stick\nwas as long as a footman's, smooth and varnished.\n\nA belief in the protective power of camphor and other pleasant-smelling\nherbs is still in existence, and we know quite a number of individuals who\ncarry about with them bags of camphor during the prevalence of an\nepidemic.\n\nBefore Howard exposed the deadly sanitary state of the prisons of this\ncountry, it was the custom to sprinkle aromatic herbs before the\nprisoners, so powerful was the noxious effluvium which exhaled from their\nfilthy bodies. The bouquet which the chaplain always carried when\naccompanying a prisoner to Tyburn, was used for the same defensive\npurpose.\n\nThe stick of the physician's cane was probably a relic of the legerdemain\nof the healer, who in superstitious times worked upon the ignorance of the\ncredulous. The modern conjuror always uses a wand in his entertainment.\nThese baubles die hard, because there is a strong conservative instinct in\nthe race which clings with tremendous tenacity to anything which has the\nsanction of antiquity.\n\nThe barber's pole is still seen even in London, and is striped blue and\nwhite, emblems of the phlebotomist, and symbolical of the blue venous\nblood, which was so ungrudgingly given by the sufferers from almost all\nmaladies. The white stripe represented the bandage used to bind up the\nwound on the arm.\n\nThe practice of the bleeders continued in fashion in England until the\nbeginning of this century. John Coutsley Lettsom, who possessed high\nliterary attainments, and who was President of the Philosophical Society\nof London, and who entertained at his house at Grove Hill, Camberwell,\nmany of the most distinguished men of his time, including Boswell and Dr.\nJohnson, and whose writings shew he was an enlightened physician, was bold\nin his treatment of disease, and a heroic bleeder. He used to say of\nhimself:--\n\n    \"When patients sick to me apply,\n      I physics, bleeds, and sweats 'em\n    Then if they choose to die,\n      What's that to me--I lets 'em.\"\n\nThe wig also constituted an essential part of the dress of the older\nphysicians. It was a three tailed one, and this with silk stockings,\nclothes well trimmed, velvet coat with stiff skirts, large cuffs and\nbuckled shoes, made quite an imposing show, and when they rode in their\ngilt carriages with two running footmen, as was the custom, no one would\nbe better recognised. It is interesting to contrast the dress and mode of\npractice of the modern physician with those who built up the honourable\ncalling of medicine. It is so easy to laugh at those who practised the art\nof medicine before modern scientific investigation had laid naked so many\nof the secrets of physiology, pathology, and vital chemistry. Slowly but\nsurely as the true nature and progress of disease has become known, so\nhave all the adventitious and unnecessary surroundings of dress\ndisappeared, and now we may meet the most eminent of our doctors, clad in\nthe same garments as a man on Change. All this was inevitable, but running\nthrough the whole history of medicine is a magnificent desire on the part\nof those who have made a mark, and of all its humbler followers to \"go\nabout doing good.\" The difficulties are enormous, the labour is colossal,\nbut there could be no convictions were there no perplexities. Credulity is\nthe disease of a feeble intellect. Accepting all things and understanding\nnothing, kills a man's intellect and checks all scientific investigation.\nThe physician has to knock at the temple of the human frame, and patiently\npick up the knowledge which nature always gives to those who love her\nbest. But the investigator must approach his subject with humility, and\nwith the recognition that there is a limit to the human intellect, and\nthat behind and above this big round world is a supreme being, that around\nthe intellect is the atmosphere of spiritual convictions from which our\nhighest and best impulses spring, that the universe not only embraces\nmaterial phenomena, but it also includes the sublime and the moral\nattributes, which no man has, or ever will, weigh in the physical balance\nor distil from a retort.\n\nThe union of Intellect and Piety will grow stronger as the world grows\nolder. When men began to think, they began to doubt, but when men have\nthought more deeply they will cease to doubt.\n\nAn idea is in the air that the study of science has a tendency to make men\nsceptical. This is an error. For surely the study of Nature in any of its\nmanifold aspects has a direct tendency to lead us into the inscrutable.\nAmongst those who demonstrate the ennobling influence of science let us\nonly name Boyle, Bacon, Kepler, and Newton. If we would select a few names\nfrom the number of medical celebrities of the past who have felt this\nelevating influence, the following will readily occur to us, Linacre,\nSydenham, Brodie, Astley Cooper, Graves Watson, and Abernethy. The latter,\nwho is chiefly remembered as a coiner of quaint sayings and personal\noriginality, had, notwithstanding his biting wit, a deep sense of the\nnobility and the sacredness of his calling, as the following extract from\na lecture which he delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons will prove.\nHe says:--\"When we examine our bodies we see an assemblance of organs\nformed of what we call matter, but when we examine our minds, we feel that\nthere is something sensitive and intelligible which inhabits our bodies.\nWe naturally believe in the existence of a first cause. We feel our own\nfree agency. We distinguish right and wrong. We feel as if we were\nresponsible for our conduct, and the belief in a future state seems\nindigenous to the mind of man.\"\n\nThe noiseless tread of time will cause many doctors whose names are now\nhousehold words to be forgotten, but we may rest assured that the wreath\nof memory will cluster round the brows of these grand, noble workers in\nthe field of medicine who have shown by their daily life that they never\nflinched from the arduous duties, aye and the dangers of their profession,\nbut steadfastly plodded on. Originality, integrity, and honesty are\nattributes which grace the life of any man, and although the history of\nmedicine claims no monopoly of these virtues, for they serve all men\nalike, yet they are the handmaids of greatness; without them no human\nbeing will ever win that true success which enables us to look back upon\nsuch lives and say, \"Here are examples which show us the possibilities of\nthe race.\" Doctors ought to be great burden lifters. Their mission is to\ncarry into the chamber of disease--and even of death itself--that calm\ncourage, that buoyant hope, which has around it a halo of sympathy and of\nencouragement.\n\nThe public are loyal to the profession of medicine, and seldom do we hear\nof any members of that calling who abuse their high privileges. Their work\nis an absorbing work; it says to a man:--\"You have placed in your hands\nthe lives of the human race. You are the true soldier whose business it\nis to give life and health and happiness to those with whom you come in\ncontact. You must not lean upon the baubles of your calling, so as to\ninspire confidence, but you must night and day let the one abiding thought\nbe concentrated upon the good of humanity,\" and there is no field of\nprofessional experience which has given us so many men who have as nobly\ndone their duty as the doctors of the past and of the present day. We seem\nto be on the threshold of a new era in the treatment of disease, and\nalready do we find an increase in the average lives of the race. No one\nneed despair of the future in that direction; indiscretion and ignorance\nkill more human beings than plague, pestilence, or famine. The public must\nhelp to tear away the veil which hides the _Truth_, by not worshipping at\nthe foot of Quackery, Chicanery, or Superstition.\n\nThe medical profession has so far escaped the pernicious tendency of\nmodern thought, which tendency is to hamper every institution. This is a\nnoteworthy fact; our hospitals, medical schools, College of Physicians,\nand College of Surgeons are not cramped and hindered by legislative\ninterference; but unostentatiously, silently, and with a never-failing\nsense of their responsibilities, do they educate and pass through their\ngates the doctors of the future--and no man dare point his finger at any\none of these, and say he does not do his duty.\n\n\n\n\nMagic and Medicine.\n\nBY CUMING WALTERS.\n\n\nColeridge once said that in the treatment of nervous cases \"he is the best\nphysician who is the most ingenious inspirer of hope.\" The great \"faith\ncures\" are worked by such physicians, and the dealers in magic at all\ntimes and in all parts achieved their successes by inspiring hope in their\npatients. The more credulous the invalid the more easy the cure, no matter\nwhat remedy is applied. Is it surprising, then, to find that among the\nmore childlike races, or that among the infant civilizations, magic often\nsupersedes medicine, or is combined with it? Ceremonies which impress the\nmind and act upon the imagination considerably aid the physician in his\ntreatment of susceptible persons. Paracelsus himself combined astrology\nwith alchemy and medicine, and his host of followers often went further\nthan their master, and relied more upon magic than upon specific remedies.\nIt was the crowd of charlatans, astrologers, wonder-workers, and their\nsort who substituted magic for medicine, and who had so great an influence\nin England three centuries ago, that Ben Jonson scourged with the lash of\nhis satire in \"The Alchemist,\" the impostor described as\n\n                  \"A rare physician,\n    An excellent Paracelsian, and has done\n    Strange cures with mineral physic. He deals all\n    With spirits, he; he will not hear a word\n    Of Galen, or his tedious recipes.\"\n\nThere has generally been sufficient superstition in all races to make\namulets the popular means of averting calamity and preserving from\nsickness. The Greeks, the Romans, the Jews, the Turks, and the Arabs, to\nsay nothing of less civilized races, have thoroughly believed that disease\ncan be charmed away by the simple expedient of wearing a token, or\ncarrying a talisman. The magical formula of Abracadabra, written in the\nform of a triangle, sufficed to cure agues and fevers; the Abraxas stones\nwarded off epidemics; the coins of St. Helena served as talismans, and\ncured epilepsy. So strong was the belief in these magical protectors in\nthe fourth century that the clergy were forbidden, under heavy penalties\nto make or to sell the charms, and in the eighth century the Christian\nChurch forbade amulets to be longer worn. In this connection it may be\nmentioned that the custom of placing the wedding-ring upon the fourth\nfinger of the left hand owes its origin to the ancients who resorted to\nmagic for the cure of their ailments. The Greeks and the Romans believed\nthat the finger in question contained a vein communicating directly with\nthe heart, and that nothing could come in contact with it without giving\ninstant warning to the seat of life. For this reason they were accustomed\nto stir up mixtures and potions with this \"medicated finger,\" as it was\ncalled, and when the ring became the symbol of marriage that finger was\nchosen of all others for the wearing of it. Thus do we unknowingly keep\nalive the superstitions of other times.\n\nThe Hindoos, whose books on the healing art date back to 1500 B.C.,\nregarded sickness as the result of the operation of malevolent deities who\nwere either to be propitiated by prayers, offerings, charms, and\nsacrifices, or to be overcome with the aid of friendly gods. The early\nGreeks when suffering from disease were cured, not by means of medicine,\nbut by religious observances, and particularly by the \"temple-sleep,\" in\nwhich they dreamt dreams which the priests interpreted, and in which were\nfound the suggestions for remedy. It was Hippocrates, in 460 B.C., who\nfirst proclaimed that disease was not of supernatural origin, and that it\ncould not be combated or cured by magic. But for many centuries later in\nEurope the Black Art had greater sway than rational treatment. In Sweden\nit is even now common for the lower classes to ascribe sickness to the\nvisitation of spirits (Nisse), who must be mollified by pouring liquor\ninto a goblet and mixing with it the filings of a bride-ring, or filings\nof silver, or of any metal that has been inherited. The mixture is taken\nto the place where the man is supposed to have caught his illness, and is\npoured over the left shoulder, not a syllable being uttered the while.\nAfter the performance of this ceremony the invalid may hope to recover.\n\nConsecrated grave-mould is supposed by many primitive races to have\nparticular properties as a medicine. The Shetlander who has a \"stitch in\nhis side,\" cures himself by applying to the affected part, some dry mould\nbrought from a grave, and heated, care being taken to remove the mould and\nto return it before the setting of the sun. In the neighbouring isles of\nOrkney, magic is also resorted to as a remedy for disease. Perhaps the\nleast harmful of the rites is the washing of a cat in the water which had\npreviously served for an invalid's ablutions, the confident belief being\nthat the disease would by this means be transferred to the animal. This\ncustom of \"substitution\" is found in many races, and is one of the most\ninteresting subjects introduced to the student of folk-lore.\n\nIn Tibet, for example, when all ordinary remedies have failed, the Lamas\nmake a dummy to represent the sick person, and they adorn the image with\ntrinkets. By ceremonies and prayers the sickness of the patient is laid\nupon the dummy, after which it is taken out and burned, the Lamas\nappropriating the ornaments as a reward. Sir Walter Scott tells of a\nsimilar case which occurred in Scotland. Lady Katharine Fowlis made a\nmodel in clay of a person whom she wished to afflict, and shot at the\nimage in the hope that the wound would be transferred to the real person.\nWe have only to turn to Scott's \"Demonology and Witchcraft\" to find\nhundreds of instances of the unshaken belief of the Highlanders in mystic\npotions, pills, drugs, and drops; and not even wholesale burnings of the\ndealers in white magic could induce the people to forsake their\nsuperstitions. Bessie Dunlop told the Court, before which she was\narraigned, of the magic elixirs given to her by Thome Reid, who had been\nkilled in battle centuries before, but had appeared to her as an\napparition, and begged her to fly with him to Elf-land. By means of his\nmedicines she cured the most stubborn diseases, obtained the reputation of\na wise woman, and grew so rich that the eye of the law was drawn upon her,\nand, after her confession was made, she was ordered to be burnt. As Scott\nsaid, in one of his chapters, the Scottish law did not acquit those who\naccomplished even praiseworthy actions, and \"the proprietor of a patent\nmedicine who should in those days have attested his having wrought such\nmiracles as we see sometimes advertised might have forfeited his life.\"\n\nThe idea of sacrificing something, or someone, to appease the anger of the\npowers who bring affliction upon mankind, is extremely common, and by no\nmeans confined to savage nations or to very ancient times. At the time of\nthe Black Plague in the fourteenth century the fanaticism of the French\nled them to sacrifice 12,000 Jews by torture and burning, these\nIsraelites being deemed the cause of the affliction. In the \"Ingoldsby\nLegends\" may be read a ghastly account of a similar sacrifice in Spain, in\norder to secure the good-will of the over-ruling powers on behalf of the\nQueen. Even in comparatively modern times the practice of sacrificing in\norder to cure or avert disease has not been unknown, and this in civilized\nlands, too. The sacrifices in these cases have, of course, been of animals\nonly, but the germ of the old and worse ritual is found in the custom. In\n1767, the people of Mull, in consequence of a disease among the cattle,\nagreed to perform an incantation. They carried to the top of Carnmoor a\nwheel and nine spindles of oakwood. Every fire in the houses was\nextinguished; and the wheel was then turned from east to west over the\nnine spindles long enough to produce fire by friction. They then\nsacrificed a heifer, which they cut in pieces and burnt while yet alive.\nFinally they lighted their own hearths from the pile, while an old man\nrepeated the words of incantation. This custom is prevalent in Ireland, in\nvarious parts of Scotland, and even in England and Wales it has been\npractised with variations and some modification. In Cornwall, in 1800, a\ncalf was burnt alive to arrest the murrain. Mr. Laurence Gomme has traced\nthe custom back to the sacrifice of animals for human sickness, for in\n1678 four men were actually prosecuted for \"sacrificing a bull in a\nheathenish manner for the recovery of the health of Custane Mackenzie.\" In\nIreland a cure for small-pox consisted in sacrificing a sheep to a wooden\nimage, wrapping the skin about the sick person, and then eating the sheep.\n\nIn Scotland strange and weird customs linger, and Sir H. G. Reid in his\nentertaining volume, \"'Tween Gloamin' and the Mirk,\" has related how he\nhimself, during infancy, underwent a mysterious cure for the \"falling\nsickness.\" He was carried secretly away to a lonely hut on the distant\nmoor, and the party were admitted to a long, low-roofed apartment, dimly\nlighted from two small windows. In one corner sat an old woman, wrinkled\nand silent, busily knitting; a huge peat-fire blazed on the open hearth,\nshooting heavy sparks up through the hole in the roof, and filling the\napartment with smoke. No word was spoken, and the scene must have been as\neerie as the lover of mystery or the believer in witchcraft could have\ndesired. \"I was placed on a three-legged stool in the middle of the\nfloor\" (the writer continues); \"the old woman rose, and with the aid of\nimmense tongs, took deliberately from the fire seven large smooth round\nstones, they were planted one by one in an irregular circle about me; with\nher dull dark eyes closed, and open white palms outstretched, the\nenchantress muttered some mystic words; it was over--the tremulous patient\nwas taken up as 'cured!'\" In Scotland the belief in witches who have power\nboth to cure and to cause maladies is so deeply founded that it would be\nrash to deny its continued existence. These creatures are credited with\nopening graves for the purpose of taking out joints of the fingers and\ntoes of dead bodies, with some of the winding-sheet, in order to prepare\npowders. In Kirkwall a small portion of the human skull was taken from the\ngraveyard and grated to a powder in order to be used in a mixture for the\ncure of fits; while in Caithness the patient was made to drink from a\nsuicide's skull, and the beverage so taken was regarded as a sovereign\nspecific for epilepsy. In 1643 one John Drugh was indicted for this\ndespoiling of corpses for some such purpose. The Australian aborigines\nhad a belief not altogether dissimilar to this. They rubbed weak persons\nwith the fat of a corpse, and thought that the strength, courage, and\nvalour of the dead man was communicated to the body subjected to the\ntreatment. Analogies may be found among savage tribes all over the world,\nand the culmination is found in the devouring of enemies, not out of\nrevenge, but because the widespread primitive idea prevails that by eating\nthe flesh and by drinking the blood of the slain, a man absorbs the nature\nor the life of the deceased into his own body. In other words, cannibalism\nhas a medical origin which the most depraved superstition suggested and\nfortified.\n\nThe Lhoosai, a savage hill-tribe in India, teach their young warriors to\neat a piece of the liver of the first man they kill in order to strengthen\ntheir hearts, and here we see the development of the magic power of the\nmedicines which is not only efficacious for the body, but for the spirit.\n\nWhen Coleridge was a little boy at the Blue Coat School, he relates in his\nTable Talk, there was a \"charm for one's foot when asleep,\" which he\nbelieved had been in the school since its foundation in the time of King\nEdward VI. Its potency lay in the words--\n\n    \"Crosses three we make to ease us,\n    Two for the thieves, and one for Christ Jesus.\"\n\nThe same charm served for cramp in the leg, and Coleridge quaintly adds:\n\"Really, upon getting out of bed, where the cramp most frequently\noccurred, pressing the sole of the foot on the cold floor, and then\nrepeating this charm, I can safely affirm that I do not remember an\ninstance in which the cramp did not go away in a few seconds.\" Charms like\nthis, by which a simple method of cure is invested with marvel, are common\nenough among primitive races, and not infrequently provide the key to the\nsolution of the mystery of the magician's triumph. The cunning leaders,\npriests, or medicine-men of ignorant nations maintain their ascendency by\nascribing to miracle the simplest feats they perform.\n\nThe superstitious red man is completely at the mercy of the medicine-man\nwho claims to possess supernatural powers, and who assumes the ability to\nwork marvellous cures by magic. Each North American Indian carries with\nhim a medicine bag obtained under very curious circumstances. When he is\napproaching manhood he sets forth in search of the patent drug which is to\nshield him from all danger, and act as an all-powerful talisman. He lies\ndown alone in the woods upon a litter of twigs, eats and drinks nothing\nfor several days, and at last falls asleep from sheer exhaustion. Then he\ndreams--or should do so--and whatever bird, or beast, or reptile, forms\nthe subject of his dream, he must seek as his medicine. He goes forth upon\nthe quest directly his strength has returned, and when he has discovered\nthe animal of his vision, he turns its skin into a pouch, and wears it\never afterwards round his neck. In peace or war he will never part with\nthis talisman; it is the treasure of his life, a sacred possession, a\ncharm against all maladies, and a protection from foes. It is scarcely\nnecessary to add, after this, that the medicine-man of the tribe is held\nin highest honour, and regarded as a worker of veritable miracles. All\nthings are possible to him. By his prayers, his rites, and his\nincantations he causes the sun to shine, the rain to descend, the rivers\nto deepen, the plants to thrive. A traveller tells us that a drought had\nwithered the maize fields, and the medicine-man was sent for to compel\nthe rain to fall. On the first day one Wah-ku, or the Shield, came to the\nfront, but failed; so did Om-pah, or the Elk. On succeeding days another\nwas tried, but without success; but at last recourse was made to\nWak-a-dah-ha-Ku, or the White Buffalo Hair, who possessed a shield\ncoloured with red lightnings, and carried an arrow in his hand. Much was\nexpected of him, and the people were not disappointed. \"Taking his station\nby the medicine-lodge,\" we are told, \"he harangued the people, protesting\nthat for the good of his tribe he was willing to sacrifice himself, and\nthat if he did not bring the much desired rain he was content to live for\nthe rest of his life with the old women and the dogs. He asserted that the\nfirst medicine-man had failed because his shield warded off the rain\nclouds; the second, who wore a head-dress made of a raven's skin, because\nthe raven was a bird that soared above the storm, and cared not whether\nthe rain came or stayed; and the third who wore a beaver skin, because the\nbeaver was always wet and required no rain. But as for him, the red\nlightnings on his shield would attract the rain-clouds, and his arrow\nwould pierce them, and pour the water over the thirsty fields. It chanced\nthat as he ended his oration, a steamer fired a salute from a twelve\npounder gun. To the Indians the roar of the cannon was like the voice of\nthunder, and their joy knew no bounds. The successful medicine-man was\nloaded with valuable gifts; mothers hastened to offer their daughters to\nhim in marriage; and the elder medicine-men hastened from the lodge to\nenrol him in their order.... Just before sunset his quick eyes discovered\na black cloud which, unobserved by the noisy multitude, swiftly came up\nfrom the horizon. At once he assumed his station on the roof of the lodge,\nstrung his bow, and made ready his arrow; arrested the attention of his\nfellows by his loud and exultant speech; and as the cloud impended over\nthe village, shot his arrow into the sky. Lo, the rain descended in\ntorrents, wetting the rain-maker to the skin, but establishing in\neverybody's mind a firm and deep conviction of his power.\"\n\nThe influence of the medicine-man in time of sickness is illustrated in\nthe narrative of Mr. Kane, who wrote \"The Wanderings of an Artist.\" He\nheard a great noise in one of the villages, and found that a handsome\nIndian girl was extremely ill. The medicine-man sat in the middle of the\nroom, crossed-legged and naked; a wooden dish filled with water was before\nhim, and he had guaranteed to rid the girl of her disease which afflicted\nher side. He commenced by singing and gesticulating in a violent manner,\nthe others who surrounded him beating drums with sticks. This lasted\nhalf-an-hour. Then the medicine-man determined on a radical cure of the\npatient, for he darted suddenly upon the girl, dug his teeth into her side\n(for she was undressed), and shook her for several minutes. This increased\nher agony, but the medicine-man declared he had \"got it,\" and held his\nhands to his mouth. After this he plunged his hands into a bowl of water,\nleaving the spectators to believe that he had torn out the disease with\nhis teeth, and was now destroying it by drowning. Eventually he withdrew\nhis hand from the bowl, and it was found that he held a piece of cartilage\nbetween the finger and thumb. This was cut in two, and half cast into the\nfire, half into the water. So ended the operation, and Mr. Kane records\nthat though the doctor was perfectly satisfied, the patient seemed, if\nanything, to be worse for the treatment.\n\nThe belief in magic was ingrained in the Egyptians, who, notwithstanding\nthat the art of medicine was far advanced with them, preferred to trust in\nthe workers of miracles and enchantments. In his recent collection of\nEgyptian Tales, Mr. Flinders-Petrie is able to supply a striking instance\nof this credulity. A man named Dedi was said to have such powers over life\nand death that he could restore the head that had been smitten from the\nbody. He was brought before the King, who desired to put this marvellous\npower to the test, and the story thus proceeds:--\"His Majesty said, 'Let\none bring me a prisoner who is in prison that his punishment may be\nfulfilled.' And Dedi said, 'Let it not be a man, O King, my lord; behold\nwe do not even thus to our cattle.' And a duck was brought unto him, and\nits head was cut off. And the duck was laid on the west side of the hall,\nand its head on the east side of the hall. And Dedi spake his magic\nspeech. And the duck fluttered along the ground, and its head came\nlikewise; and when it had come part to part the duck stood and quacked.\nAnd they brought likewise a goose before him, and he did even so unto it.\nHis Majesty caused an ox to be brought, and its head cast on the ground.\nAnd Dedi spake his magic speech. And the ox stood upright behind him, and\nfollowed him with his halter trailing on the ground.\" This story prepares\nus in every way for the information that the Egyptians, despite their\ngreat knowledge of the curative powers of herbs and drugs, preferred to\nrely upon enchanters, soothsayers, and magicians in their time of illness\nand peril.\n\nProfessor Douglas, in his \"Society in China,\" devotes a very interesting\nand entertaining chapter to medicine as regarded and practised by the\nCelestials. From this we learn that while there are plenty of doctors in\nthe land, they are one and all the merest empirics, who prey on the folly,\nthe ignorance, and the dread of the uneducated people. The failure to cure\nany disease brings no odium upon the quack, though when the late Emperor\n\"ascended on a dragon to be a guest on high,\" or, in other words, died of\nsmall-pox, his physicians who could not save him from that distinction\nwere deprived of honours and rewards. The Chinese are centuries behind\nother nations in medicine, and they have not yet learnt that the blood\ncirculates in the body, or that a limb may be removed with beneficial\neffects in case of some diseases or accidents. They believe that arteries\nand veins are one and the same, and that the pulses communicate with the\nvarious organs of the body. The object of the physician is to \"strengthen\nthe breath, stimulate the gate of life, restore harmony.\" \"The heart is\nthe husband, and the hinges are the wife,\" and they must be brought into\nagreement, or evil arises. Good results may be obtained, it is believed,\nby such tonics as dog-flesh, dried red-spotted lizard-skins,\ntortoise-shell, fresh tops of stag-horns, bones and teeth of dragons (when\nobtainable), shavings of rhinoceros-horns, and such like. For dyspepsia\nthe doctor has no nostrum, but he thrusts a needle into the patient's\nliver and expects him to be immediately cured. When cholera or any other\npestilence sweeps over the land, the Chinese feel the helplessness of\ntheir physicians, so they resort to charms, and to the offering of gifts\nto the gods by way of staying the plague. Hydrophobia is common among the\nhalf-starved curs which infest the streets, and the cure for it--quite\nunknown to Pasteur--is the curd of the black pea dried and pulverised,\nmixed with hemp oil, and formed into a large ball; this is to be rolled\nover the wound, then broken open, and kept on rolling until it has lost\nits hair-like appearance. To complete the cure the patient must abstain\nfrom eating \"anything in a state of decomposition.\" He might just as well\nbe told not to poison himself. If, by the way, the prescription does not\nwork, but hydrophobia continues, the patient is strongly commended to try\nthe effect of \"the skull, teeth, and toes of a tiger ground up, and given\nin wine in doses of one-fifth of an ounce.\" While the tiger is being\ncaught, however, a fatal result may occur, but of course the Chinese\ndoctor is not to be blamed for that. He has done his best, and the fault\nis obviously the tiger's. The Chinese believe in astrology, the\nphilosopher's stone, and the elixir of life. A plant known as ginseng is\nsaid to greatly prolong and sweeten existence, and sometimes as much as a\nthousand taels of silver are given for a pound's weight of the precious\nroot. It will be seen, therefore, from such facts as these that a Galen in\nChina would have a vast revolution to undertake, and that a thousand\nGalens at least would be required to overcome the prejudices and uproot\nthe superstitions of the race. The great value which the Chinese attach to\nthe bones, horns, tusks, and eyes of animals may be judged from various\ntonics and remedies which are in great request among all classes. A dose\nof tigers' bones inspires courage; an elephant's eye burnt to powder and\nmixed with human milk is a sovereign remedy for inflammation of the eye;\npulverised elephants' bones cure indigestion; a preparation of elephants'\nivory is the recognised cure for diabetes; and the same animal's teeth may\nbe used for epilepsy. But if the patient cannot eat rice his case is\nabandoned as hopeless, and not even the physician who deals most\nextensively in magic pills, ointments, and decoctions will attempt to save\nthe obstinate person's life.\n\nThe medicine-men of the Eskimos were called angekoks, and enjoyed the\nunlimited confidence of the people. They were said to have equal power\nover heaven and earth, this world and the next. This made them useful as\nfriends and dangerous as enemies. The Eskimo, therefore, set out upon no\nenterprise without consulting the angekoks, who granted blessings,\nexorcised demons, and gave charms against disease. These medicine-men have\na profound belief in themselves, and though they resort to jugglery and\nventriloquism to deceive their visitors, they appear to have no idea that\nthey are perpetrating an imposture. Their particular powers, they think,\nare derived from more than human sources. Dr. Nansen, in his \"Eskimo\nLife,\" points out that it has always been to the interests of the\nmedicine-men and the priests to sustain and mature superstitions or\nreligious ideas. \"They must therefore themselves appear to believe in\nthem; they may even discover new precepts of divinity to their own\nadvantage, and thereby increase both their power and their revenues.\" The\nGreenlanders believe that the angekoks work with the help of ministering\nspirits, called _tornat_, who are often none other than the souls of dead\npersons, especially of grandfathers; but not infrequently the _tornat_ are\nsupposed to be the souls of departed animals, or of fairies. The angekok\nis assumed to have several of these councillors always at hand. They\nrender help in the time of danger, and may even act as avengers or\ndestroyers. In the latter case they show themselves as ghosts, and so\nfrighten to death the persons against whom vengeance is directed.\nTherefore, as Dr. Nansen reports, the angekoks are the wisest and also the\ncraftiest of all Eskimos. They assert that they have the power of\nconversing with spirits, of travelling in the under-world, of conjuring\nup powerful spirits, and of obtaining revelations. \"They influence and\nwork upon their countrymen principally through their mystic exorcisms and\n_seances_, which occur as a rule in the winter, when they are living in\nhouses. The lamps are extinguished, and skins hung before the windows. The\nangekok himself sits upon the floor. By dint of making a horrible noise so\nthat the whole house shakes, changing his voice, bellowing and shrieking,\nventriloquising, groaning, moaning, and whining, beating on drums,\nbursting forth into diabolical shrieks of laughter and all sorts of other\ntricks, he persuades his companions that he is visited by the various\nspirits he personates, and that it is they who make the disturbance.\" They\ncure diseases by reciting charms, and \"give men a new soul.\" He demands\nlarge fees, not for himself, he explains, but for the spirits whose agent\nhe is. Apparently these spirits have similar ideas to the London\nconsulting physician.\n\nMr. Theodore Bent, in his \"Ruined Cities of Mashonaland,\" gives a specimen\nof the credulity excited by the medicine-men. The explorer desired to\ninterview a chief, Mtoko by name, but permission was refused. The reason,\nhe afterwards ascertained, was that the chief's father had died shortly\nafter another white man's visit, and the common belief was that he had\nbeen bewitched. The chief thought that the \"white lady\" who ruled over the\nnation to which Mr. Bent belonged had sent him purposely to cast a glamour\nover him. It may be remembered that the ill-fated Lobengula refused to\nhave his portrait taken because he believed that by means of the image of\nhimself he could be magically infected with a dread disease. This idea of\nsubstitution, which has already been referred to, is akin to that of the\nbelief in witchcraft during the middle ages--namely, that the witches\ncould, by sticking pins into the wax image of a person, bring upon that\nperson agonising maladies. The dreadful results of such beliefs among\nsavage tribes is told by the two hospital nurses who a year or so ago\nproduced a lively book, \"Adventures in Mashonaland.\" One morning a native\nentered their camp, bringing a tale of horror. A chief called Maronka,\nwhose kraal was about forty miles away, had boiled his family alive. He\nhad been convinced by the native doctors that after death the souls of the\nchiefs passed into the bodies of lions. His medicine-men had \"smelt out\"\nhis own family as witches, and boiling alive was the requisite punishment.\nMr. Rider Haggard has told many such stories as this in his books on South\nAfrica. The Zulu doctors were in the habit, not only of \"smelling out\"\nwitches and evil spirits, but of sprinkling the soldiers with medicine, in\norder to \"put a great heart into them,\" and ensure their victory in\nbattle.\n\nCustoms like these gave Charles Dickens his opportunity of writing two of\nhis most scathing satires \"The Noble Savage\" and \"The Medicine Man of\nCivilisation.\" He refused to subscribe to the popular and amiable\nsentiment that the African barbarian was an interesting survival, or that\nthe Ojibbeway Indian was picturesque. After a severe indictment of them,\nDickens instanced their customs in medicine as a proof of their\nirremediable depravity. \"When the noble savage finds himself a little\nunwell,\" he wrote, \"and mentions the circumstance to his friends, it is\nimmediately perceived that he is under the influence of witchcraft. A\nlearned personage, called an Imyanger, or Witch Doctor, is sent for to\nNooker the Umtargartie, or smell out the witch. The male inhabitants of\nthe kraal being seated on the ground, the learned doctor, got up like a\ngrizzly bear, appears and administers a dance of the most terrific nature,\nduring the exhibition of which remedy he incessantly gnashes his teeth,\nand howls,--'I am the original physician to Nooker the Umtargartie. Yow,\nyow, yow! No connection with any other establishment. Till, till, till!\nAll other Umtargarties are feigned Umtargarties, Boroo, Boroo! but I\nperceive here a genuine and real Umtargartie, Hoosh, Hoosh, Hoosh! in\nwhose blood, I, the original Imyanger and Nookerer, will wash these bear's\nclaws of mine!' All this time the learned physician is looking out among\nthe attentive faces for some unfortunate man who owes him a cow, or who\nhas given him any small offence, or against whom, without offence, he has\nconceived a spite. Him he never fails to Nooker as the Umtargartie, and he\nis instantly killed.\" This is no burlesque, and I have given the record in\nDickens's inimitable language because it most vividly sets before us the\ncustom of the medicine-men of barbarous races. But the medicine-men of\nLongfellow's description, the men who came to appease and console\nHiawatha, who\n\n    \"Walked in silent, grave procession,\n    Bearing each a pouch of healing,\n    Skin of beaver, lynx, or otter,\n    Filled with magic roots and simples,\n    Filled with very potent medicines,\"\n\n--these may be accepted as the milder type of magicians who, among a\nprimitive people, claimed not only to be able to heal the living, but to\nrestore the dead.\n\nMr. Austine Waddell, in his exhaustive work on the Buddhism of Tibet,\ntells us that a very popular form of Buddha is as \"the supreme physician\"\nor Buddhist AEsculapius, the idea of whom is derived from an ancient legend\nof the \"medicine-king\" who dispensed spiritual medicine. The images of\nthis Buddha are worshipped as fetishes, and they cure by sympathetic\nmagic. The supplicant, after bowing and praying, rubs his finger over the\neye, knee, or particular part of the image corresponding to the affected\npart on his own body, and then applies the finger carrying this hallowed\ntouch to the afflicted spot. Mr. Waddell says that this constant friction\nis rather detrimental to the features of the god; whether it is beneficial\nto the man's body is of course largely a matter of faith and\ncircumstances. As might be expected, talismans to ward off evils from\nmalignant planets and demons, whence come all diseases, are in great\nrequest. The eating of the paper on which a charm has been written is\nconsidered by the Tibetan to be the easiest and most certain method of\ncuring a malady, and the spells which the Lamas use in this way are called\n\"za-yig,\" or edible letters. A still more mystical way of applying these\nremedies, according to Mr. Waddell, is by the washings of the reflection\nof the writing in a mirror, a habit common in other quarters of the globe.\nIn Gambia, for instance, this treatment is relied upon by the natives. A\ndoctor is called in, he examines the patient, and then sits down at the\nbedside and writes in Arabic characters on a slate some sentences from the\nKoran. The slate is then washed, and the dirty infusion is drunk by the\npatient. In Tibet, Chinese ink is smeared on wood, and every twenty-nine\ndays the inscription reflected in a mirror. The face of the mirror during\nthe reflection is washed with beer, and the drainings are collected in a\ncup for the patient's use. This is a special cure for the evil eye. The\nmedicine-men of Tibet can also supply charms against bullets and weapons,\ncharms for the clawing of animals, charms to ward off cholera, and even\ncharms to prevent domestic broils. This is surely evidence of high\ncivilisation.\n\nIt would be hopeless to endeavour to exhaust this subject. Only a few\nselected instances can be given to illustrate how large a part magic has\nplayed, and still plays, in the healing art. Medicine is by no means freed\nof its superstitions yet, and the success of quack advertisements of the\nday abundantly proves that the civilised public is still prone to believe\nthat universal remedies are obtainable, and that miracles can be wrought.\n\nModern medical science, as one of its great exponents has pointed out,\nplays a waiting game when miracles are spoken of, and when magic is\nclaimed to supersede specific remedies. \"When it is asked to believe in\nthe violent and erratic violation of laws of matter and force, science\nstands on an impregnable rock, fenced round by bulwarks of logical fact,\nand flanked by the bastions of knowledge of nature and her constitution.\"\nAnd as exact knowledge spreads, Prospero will have no alternative but to\nbreak his staff, and bury it fathoms deep.\n\n\n\n\nChaucer's Doctor of Physic.\n\nBY W. H. THOMPSON.\n\n\nIn the \"Canterbury Tales\" we have an inimitable gallery of fourteenth\ncentury portraits, drawn from life, with all a great master's delicacy of\nfinish and touch. And in none of these pictures does Chaucer excel himself\nmore than in that of his \"Doctor of Physic.\" We may take it for granted\nthat the portrait is no mere fanciful one, with its pre-Raphaelite\nminuteness of detail, sketched with the poet's own peculiar skill. With\nwhat mischievous and yet altogether playful and good-natured humour is the\nman of medicine presented to us!\n\n    \"With us there was a doctour of phisike\n    In all this world ne was there none like him\n    To speak of phisike and of surgerie.\"\n\nWhat manner of man was this paragon of medical knowledge? In personal\nappearance he was somewhat of an exquisite. \"Clothes are unspeakably\nsignificant\" saith the immortal Teufelsdrockh, and every practitioner who\nhas his _clientele_ largely yet to make knows the importance of being\nwell dressed. Chaucer's grave graduate was apparelled in a purple surcoat,\nand a blue and white furred hood.\n\n    \"In sanguine and in perse he clad was all\n    Lined with taffata and with sendall,\"\n\nand yet no luxurious sybarite by any means was he,\n\n    \"Of his diet measureable was he,\n    For it was no superfluity,\n    But of great nourishing and digestable.\"\n\nA man of simple habits, even perhaps given to holding his purse strings\nsomewhat tightly.\n\n    \"He was but easy of expense,\n    He kept that he won in pestilence.\"\n\nFor, as the poet adds with his characteristic merry sly humour,\n\n    \"Gold in physic is a cordial,\n    Therefore he loved gold in special.\"\n\nThe science of medicine since Chaucer's day has made extraordinary\nadvances, and it is only fair to judge his doctor by contemporary\nstandards. To-day, we fear, he would be largely regarded as little better\nthan a charlatan and a quack. It is true, he was acquainted with all the\nauthorities, ancient and modern, from AEsculapius and Galen down to\nGaddesden, the author of the \"Rosa Anglica,\" the great English book of\nfourteenth century medicine. But this last named luminary of physic would\naid him very little on the road to true knowledge. This medical \"Rose,\"\nwhich Leland calls a \"large and learned work,\" only serves to illustrate\nthe impotence of the professors of the healing arts at that period. This\nis the recipe of Gaddesden for the small-pox. \"After this (the appearance\nof the eruption) cause the whole body of your patient to be wrapped in red\nscarlet cloth, and command everything about the bed to be made red. This\nis an excellent cure. It was in this manner I treated the son of the noble\nking of England when he had the small-pox, and I cured him without leaving\nany marks.\" To cure epilepsy, he orders the patient \"and his parents\" to\nfast three days, and then go to church. \"The patient must first confess,\nand he must have mass on Friday and Saturday, and then on Sunday the\npriest must read over the patient's head the gospel for September, in the\ntime of vintage after the feast of the Holy Cross. After this the priest\nshall write out this portion of the gospel reverently, and bind it about\nthe patient's neck, and he shall be cured.\" If epilepsy was to be\nexorcised by such a remedy as this, we venture to assert that it must have\nbeen largely a case of faith-healing.\n\n[Illustration: GEOFFREY CHAUCER.\n\n(_From Harleian M.S.--4866 fol. 91._)]\n\nSeeing then that such was the condition of the science of medicine in\nChaucer's days, we must take with a good deal of reservation his statement\nthat his doctor\n\n    \"Knew the cause of every malady\n    Were it of cold, or hot, or moist, or dry,\n    And where engendered, and of what humour.\"\n\nAnyhow, some of the remedies prescribed for the \"sick man,\" and the\n\"drugs,\" which his friends the apothecaries were so ready to supply, would\nhave seemed extraordinary enough to us.\n\nThe poet tells us the doctor's study was but \"little in the Bible,\" and\nthat though a \"perfect practitioner,\" the ground of his scientific\nknowledge was astronomy, _i.e._, astrology; the \"better part of medicine,\"\nas Roger Bacon calls it. In dealing with his patients he was guided by\n\"natural magic.\"\n\nTo this practice Chaucer alludes in another of his poems, the \"House of\nFame.\"\n\n    \"And clerks eke, which con well,\n    All this magic naturell,\n    That craftily do her intents,\n    To make in certain ascendents,\n    Images--lo through which magic,\n    To make a man be whole or sick.\"\n\nSo that in spite of what appears to us the charlatanry in his make up, the\ndoctor was supposed to be a person of importance in the eyes of his fellow\npilgrims, with quite the standing of an accredited medical man of to-day,\nis evidenced by the manner in which mine host Bailly addresses him. Master\nBailly was no particular respecter of persons, indeed, on the contrary, he\nwas somewhat of a Philistine; yet he was all respect to this man of\nmedicine. It is as \"Sir\" Doctor of Physic, the host addresses him; also\ndeclaring him to be a \"proper man,\" and like a prelate. After the story of\nchicanery related by the Canon's Yeoman, it is to the physician he looks\nto tell a tale of \"honest matter.\" Such is his bearing towards him\nthroughout.\n\nThe doctor's contribution to the \"Canterbury Tales,\" too, is of a serious,\nsober kind, in keeping with his character; and concludes with some sound\nmoral advice. Therefore, whatever foibles he may have, the \"doctor of\nphysic\" is presented to us as a sterling gentleman, no unworthy\npredecessor of those who to-day, on more modern lines, still follow in his\nfootsteps.\n\n\n\n\nThe Doctors Shakespeare Knew.\n\nBY A. H. WALL.\n\n    \"O, mickle is the powerful grace that lies\n    In herbs, plants, shrubs, and their true qualities.\n    For nought so vile that on the earth doth live\n    But to the earth some special good doth give;\n    Nor ought so good, but, strained from that fair use\n    Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse.\"\n                                  --_Romeo and Juliet._\n\n    \"By medicine life may be prolong'd.\"--_Cymbeline V. 5._\n\n\nIn Walckenaer's \"Memoirs of Madame de Sevigne,\" and in the amusing,\ninteresting volume which Gaston Boissier devoted to her works and letters,\nwe have glimpses of the medical profession in France, which show us it was\nin her time and country, just what it was in England in the same century\nwhen it was known to Shakespeare. For one more or less genuine physician\nthere were thousands of charlatans and quacks, and the contempt which our\ngreat dramatic poet frequently expresses in his works for medical\npractitioners must, in fairness, be regarded as applicable to the latter,\nnot to the former. In 1884, an American writer on this subject (Dr. Rush\nField, in his \"Medical Thoughts of Shakespeare\") strove to show that our\ngreat philosophic poet and playwright's opinion of all the medical\npractitioners was a low one. \"He uses them frequently,\" he says, \"as a\ntool by which deaths are produced through the means of poison, and\ngenerally treats them with contempt.\" That he might fairly do this, and\nthat in doing it he rather displayed respect and regard for the genuine,\nmore or less scientific professors of the healing art, can be very readily\ndemonstrated by anyone at all familiar with his plays. But to return to\nMadame de Sevigne. At a time when she was growing old, when her letters\nspeak so sadly of the dying condition of Cardinal de Retz at Commercy, of\nMadame de la Fayette's being consumed by slow fever, and La Roche confined\nto his armchair by gout, of Corbinelle's threatened insanity, and of his\ntaking \"potable gold\" as a remedy for headache, she writes also of\nsmall-pox and other fevers having permanently settled at Versailles and\nSaint-Germain, where the King and Queen were attacked, and ladies and\ngentlemen of the Court were decimated, and cases of apoplexy and\nrheumatism were rapidly increasing in every direction. \"Fashionable folk,\nused up with pleasure-making, sick through disappointed ambition,\nfidgetting without motive, agitating without aim, tainted with morbid\nfancies and suspicion,\" found themselves in the doctor's hands, and were\nfar more ready to select practitioners who promised magically swift and\neasy cures, than those who spoke of slow and gradual recovery by means\nwhich were neither painless nor pleasurable. \"Everybody,\" says Boissur,\n\"women included, battled with one another to possess marvellous secrets\nwhereby obstinate complaints should be immediately cured. Madame Fouquet\napplied a plaster to the dying Queen, which cured her, to the great\nscandal of the Faculty unable to save her; and the Princess de Tarente\nserved out drugs to all her people at Vitre.\n\n[Illustration: WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.\n\n(_The Stratford Portrait._)]\n\nMadame Sevigne wrote of her as \"the best doctor in the upper classes; she\nhas rare and valuable compounds of which she gives us three pinches with\nprodigious effect.\" When writing to her daughter, she begs her not to\nneglect taking such medicines as \"cherry water,\" \"extract of periwinkles,\"\n\"viper-broth,\" \"uric acid,\" and \"powdered crab's-eyes.\" She says the\nextract of periwinkles \"endowed Madame de Grignam with a second youth.\"\nWriting to her daughter, \"If you use it, when you re-appear so fair\npeople will cry, 'O'er what blessed flower can she have walked,' then I\nwill answer 'On the periwinkle.'\" She tells, too, how the Capuchins, who\nstill retained their ancient medical reputation, treated the rheumatism in\nher leg \"with plants bruised and applied twice a day; taken off while wet\ntwice a day, and buried in the earth, so that as they rotted away her\npains might in like way decrease.\" \"It's a pity you ran and told the\nsurgeons this,\" she says to her daughter, \"for they roar with laughter at\nit, but I do not care a fig for them.\" In like way Madame de Scudery tells\nBassy, \"There is an abbe here who is making a great bother by curing by\nsympathy. For fever of all kinds, so they say, he takes the patient's\nspittle and mingles it with an egg, and gives it to a dog; the dog dies\nand the patient recovers.... They say he has cured a quantity of people.\"\n\nTurning from these illustrations of medical practice in France to see how\nidentical it is with that adopted in England when Shakespeare lived, we\nrecall the advice of that eminent gentleman, Andrew Rourde, who recommends\npeople to wash their faces once a week only, using a scarlet cloth to wipe\nthem dry upon, as a sure remedy in certain cases. In other instances we\nfind that certain pills made from the skulls of murderers taken down from\ngibbets, and ground to powder for that purpose, were popular as medicine,\nthat a draught of water drunk from a murdered man's skull had wonderful\nmedicinal properties, and that the blood of a dragon was absolutely\nmiraculous in the cures it effected. The touch of a dead man's hand was\nanother ghastly remedy in common use, and the powder of mummy was a\nwonderful cure for certain grave complaints. Love-philtres were also\nregarded from a medicinal point of view, and the strange doings of quack\n_accoucheurs_ are not less absurdly terrible. That the seventeenth century\nphysician himself was not always proof against these products of ancient\nignorance and superstition, is abundantly apparent. Van Helmont, the son\nof a nobleman, born in Brussels, and very carefully educated for his\nprofession, practised both medicine and magic medicinally. He rejected\nGalen, inclined to that illiterate pretender Paracelsus, and determined\nthat the only way by which he could defy disease, and utterly destroy it,\nwas through what he called _Archaeus_. Speaking of digestion, for instance,\nhe denied that it was either chemical or mechanical in its nature, but the\nresult of this _Archaeus_, a spiritual activity, working in a very\nmysteriously complicated way, for both evil and good. It has been said\nthat he was one of Lord Bacon's disciples, but for that assertion there\ncertainly is no sufficient foundation, for Bacon, if a mystic by\ninclination, was logical in reasoning. In England Van Helmont had an\nEnglish follower in the person of another physician, Dr. Fludd, a disciple\nof the famous inventor of the camera obscura, and conjecturally the first\nphotographer. His grand quack remedy was \"the powder of sympathy,\" which\nwas the \"sword-salve\" of Paracelsus (composed of moss taken from the skull\nof a gibbetted murderer, of warm human blood, human suet, linseed oil,\nturpentine, etc.). This was applied, not to the wound, but to the sword\nthat inflicted it, kept \"in a cool place!\" Certain plants pulled up with\nthe left hand were regarded as a sure remedy in fever cases, but the\ngatherer, while gathering, was not to look behind, for that deprived the\nplants of their medicinal value.\n\nAmongst other physicians of Shakespeare's century was Mr. Valentine\nGreatrake, who came to London from Ireland, where his supposed magical\ncures had been awakening a great sensation. He hired a large house in\nLincoln's Inn Fields, to which vast crowds of patients of all kinds and\nconditions crowded daily, all clamouring to be cured. He received them in\ntheir order, says an eye-witness, with \"a grave and simple countenence.\"\nFor, as Shakespeare wrote, \"Thus credulous fools are caught.\" (\"Comedy of\nErrors,\" 1, 2.) Greatrake (afterwards executed for high treason) asserted\nthat every diseased person was possessed by a devil, and that by his\nprayers and laying on of hands the devil could be cast out. Lord Conway\nsent for him to cure an incurable disease from which his wife was\nsuffering, and even some of the most learned and eminent people of the\ntime were amongst his patrons. St. Evremond wrote, \"You can hardly imagine\nwhat a reputation he gained in a short time. Catholics and Protestants\nvisited him from every part, all believing that power from heaven was in\nhis hands.\"\n\nIn an Act of Parliament which was passed in the year 1511, we read, in its\npreamble, that \"the science and cunning of Physic and Surgery\" was\nexercised by \"a great multitude of ignorant persons, of whom the greater\npart have no manner of insight in the same, nor in any other kind of\nlearning--some also can read no letters in the book--so far forth that\ncommon artificers, as smiths, weavers, and women, boldly and accostumably\ntook upon them great cures, and things of great difficulty, in which they\npartly used sorceries and witchcraft, and partly supplied such medicines\nunto the diseased as are very noisome, and nothing meet therefore; to the\nhigh displeasure of God,\" etc.\n\nA large number of the pretended remedies thus used in medical practice are\nclearly traceable back to the ancient Magi, who were professors of\nmedicine, as well as priests and astrologers.\n\nWith these facts before you, turn to your Shakespeare, and see how he\nregarded the popular delusions thus created and fostered, with their\n\n    \"Distinguished cheaters, prating mountebanks,\n    And many such libertines of sin.\"\n                                  --_Comedy of Errors._\n\nDo you remember the other lines from this source, in which the poet speaks\nof \"This pernicious slave,\" who \"forsooth took on him as a conjurer, and,\ngazing in mine eyes, feeling my pulse, and with no face, as't were,\noutfacing me, cried out I was possessed.\" This is not the stern, grave\ndoctor in \"Macbeth,\" who did not pretend to \"raze out the written troubles\nof the brain,\" but said, \"Therein the patient must minister unto himself.\"\nThere is no depreciation of the healing art in Shakespeare's painting of\nLear's physician, as there is of the \"caitiff wretch\" of an apothecary,\nwho sold poison to Romeo in a very different way to that in which the\nphysician in Cymbeline supplied a deadly drug to the Queen. \"I beseech\nyour grace,\" says he, speaking in solemn earnestness, \"without offence\n(my conscience bids me ask) wherefore you have commanded of me these most\npoisonous compounds.\" In \"All's well that Ends Well,\" you will recognize\nthe foregoing descriptions of medicinal delusions in the interview between\nHelena and the King, who says, we \"may not be so credulous of cure, when\nour most learned doctors leave us, and the congregated college have\nconcluded that labouring art can never ransom Nature from her maid estate,\nI say we must not so stain our judgment, or corrupt our hope, to\nprostitute our past-cure malady to empirics.\" In this play both \"Galen and\nParacelsus\" are mentioned, and their names then represented rival schools\nof medicine.\n\nHow smartly and merrily Shakespeare wrote of such cures as Greatrake\nprofessed to effect, we see in Henry VI., where Simpcox, supposed to be\nmiraculously cured of blindness, is asked to and does describe what he\nsees, \"If thou _hadst_ been born blind, thou might'st as well have known\nall our names as thus to name the several colours we do wear.\"\n\nIn the \"Merry Wives of Windsor\" we have \"Master Caius that calls himself\ndoctor of physic,\" and is called by Dame Quickly a \"fool and physician.\"\nThe two were in Shakespeare's time very commonly combined, and often, as\nwe have shown, very strangely. Dr. Caius was a real name borne by a\nlearned gentleman who was physician to Queen Elizabeth. In Cymbeline the\nname of the physician is Cornelius. This again was the name of a real\nphysician, who, in the sixteenth century, gained great reputation in\nEurope chiefly by restoring Charles V. to health after a tediously long\nillness. We may presume that Shakespeare was familiar with the fact.\n\nAmongst the doctors of our poet's time it was a common custom to throw up\ncases when they believed them hopeless. Shakespeare's Sempronius says,\n\"His friends, like physicians, thrice gave him o'er,\" and Lord Bacon in\nhis work on \"The Advancement of Learning,\" says of Physicians, \"In the\nenquiry of diseases, they do abandon the cures of many, some as in their\nnature incurable, and others as past the period of cure, so that Sylla\ntriumvirs never prescribed so many men to die as they do by their ignorant\nedicts.\" We have spoken of the sword-salve cure for wounds. Of dealers in\npoison who visited fairs and market-places, and attracted crowds by the\naid of a stage fool, we get a glimpse in \"Hamlet,\" where Laertes says:--\n\n    \"I bought an unction of a mountebank,\n    So mortal, that but dip a knife in it,\n    Where it draws blood, no cataplasm so rare\n    Collected from all simples that have virtue,\n    Under the moon can save the thing from death.\"\n\nThere is a hit at doctors who gave others remedies they had not enough\nfaith in to adopt for themselves:--\n\n    \"Thou speak'st like a physician, Helicarnus:\n    Who minister'st a potion unto me\n    That thou would'st tremble to receive thyself.\"\n                                  --_Pericles._\n\nIn the same play the true physician receives full appreciation. Cerimon\nsays of himself:--\n\n                            \"'Tis known, I ever\n    Have studied physic, through which secret art,\n    By turning o'er authorities, I have\n    Together with my practice, made familiar\n    To me, and to my aid, the blest infusions\n    That dwell in vegitives, in metals, stones.\n    And I can speake of the disturbances\n    That nature works, and of her cures; which doth give me\n    A more content in course of true delight\n    Than to be thirsty after tottering honour,\n    Or tie my treasure up in silken bags,\n    To please the fool, and death.\"\n\nAnd one of the two listening gentlemen adds:--\n\n    \"Your honour has through Ephesus pour'd forth\n    Your charity, and hundreds call themselves\n    Your creatures, who by you have been restored.\"\n\nAnd Pericles, with his supposed dead wife in his arms, turning to Cerimon,\nwho has saved her from the grave, says:--\n\n                      \"Reverend Sir,\n    The gods can have no mortal officer\n    More like a god than you.\"\n\nAnd Gower, speaking the concluding lines of the play, adds:--\n\n    \"In reverend Cerimon there well appears\n    The worth that learned charity aye wears.\"\n\n    \"_Cerimon_:            I hold it ever\n    Virtue and cunning (wisdom) were endowment greater\n    Than nobleness and riches....\"\n\nThere was, perhaps, when Shakespeare wrote the above lines, some thought\nof the Elizabethan nobleman, Edmund, Earl of Derby, who \"was famous for\nchirurgerie, bone-setting, and hospitalite,\" as Ward says in his Diary; of\nthe Marquis of Dorchester, who in his time was a Fellow of the College of\nSurgeons; or of the poet's son-in-law, Dr. Hall, a gentleman who resided\nin Stratford-on-Avon, in a fine old half timber house still standing, and\nknown as Hall's Croft. To his wife, the poet's elder daughter, Shakespeare\nbequeathed his house and grounds, which Dr. Hall occupied when he died.\nHis grave is near that of his glorious father-in-law, and on it is the\nfollowing inscription:--\n\n    \"HERE LYETH Y{E} BODY OF JOHN HALL,\n    GENT: HE MARR: SVSANNA Y{E} DAUGHTER\n    AND CO HEIRE OF WILL. SHAKESPEARE,\n    GENT. HEE DECEASED NOVE{R} 25 A{O} 1635\n    AGED 60.\n\n    Hallius hic situs est medica celeberrimus arte\n      Expectans regni gaudia laeta Dei\n    Dignus erat meritis qui Nestora vinceret annis,\n      In terris omnes, sed rapit aequa dies;\n    Ne tumulo, quid desit adest fidissima conjux\n      Et vitae Comitem nunc quoque mortis habet.\"\n\n\n\n\nDickens' Doctors.\n\nBY THOMAS FROST.\n\n\nDickens, it must be admitted by even the greatest admirers of his\ninimitable genius, among whom the writer of this paper must be counted,\nwas not successful in his delineations of the medical profession. Though\nhis most humorous as well as his most pathetic pictures of human life are\ndrawn from the humbler walks in the pilgrimage of humanity, he has given\nus some good touches of his skill in his presentments of other\nprofessions, and notably of lawyers and lawyers' clerks. Nothing in\nfiction can excel his legal characters in, for instance, \"Bleak\nHouse,\"--his Mr. Tulkinghorn, Mr. Guppy, the clerk, and Mr. Snagsby, the\nlaw stationer. But a life-like doctor cannot be found in his works, and\nthe nearest approaches to such a description are the merest sketches.\n\nThe most strongly marked of these are Dr. Parker Peps and Mr. Pilkins, the\ntwo members of the faculty who officiate at the closing scene in the life\nof Mrs. Dombey, in which a sense of humour, with difficulty suppressed by\nthe author, mingles with the touching sadness of the death. Dr. Parker\nPeps, \"one of the Court physicians, and a man of immense reputation for\nassisting at the increase of great families,\" is introduced \"walking up\nand down the drawing-room with his hands behind him, to the unspeakable\nadmiration of the family surgeon, who had regularly puffed the case for\nthe last six weeks among all his friends and acquaintances as one to which\nhe was in hourly expectation, day and night, of being summoned in\nconjunction with Dr. Parker Peps.\" But in this little interlude, the two\nactors in which do not appear again, the obsequiousness of Mr. Pilkins to\nthe Court physician, and the manner in which the latter, with assumed\nobliviousness, substitutes \"her grace, the duchess\" or \"her ladyship\" for\nMrs. Dombey, verge on caricature, a tendency Dickens seems to have had at\nall times some difficulty in resisting.\n\nOf Dr. Slammer also we have only a sketch, and that of the slightest\ncharacter. Though he is described as \"one of the most popular personages\nin his own circle,\" we gather from the incidents in which he appears only\nthat he was very irascible. As we read of his furious jealousy of Jingle,\nand the interrupted duel with Winkle, who had received his challenge to\nthe former by mistake, we wonder at the circle in which this \"little fat\nman, with a ring of upright black hair round his head, and an extensive\nbald plain on the top of it,\" was one of the most popular personages.\nHarold Skimpole, we are told, had been educated for the medical\nprofession; but his training seems to have left no traces of it upon his\ncharacter or his conversation. He prefers to dabble in literature and\nmusic for his own amusement, and look to his friends for the means of\nliving, too prosaic an occupation for himself.\n\nOne of the best, but not quite the best, of the medical characters in\nDickens' novels, is Allan Woodcourt, who \"had gone out a poor ship's\nsurgeon, and had come home nothing better,\"--the young man hastily called\nin when the death of Nemo is discovered, in conjunction with \"a testy\nmedical man, brought from his dinner, with a broad snuffy upper lip, and a\nbroad Scotch tongue.\" Allan Woodcourt has the kindness of heart which\ncharacterises the profession, and exemplifies it very pleasingly in the\nscene with the brickmaker's wife, and with poor Jo, the forlorn waif who\nis kept continually moving on by the police. How tenderly, too, he deals\nwith Richard Carstone, the weak-minded victim of the long-drawn Chancery\nsuit. And his head is as sound as his heart is soft. \"You,\" says Richard\nto him, \"can pursue your art for its own sake, and can put your hand to\nthe plough and never turn; and can strike a purpose out of anything.\" What\na world of difference we see in this briefly sketched trait to the want of\nearnestness of purpose and steadfastness of pursuit in the character of\nyoung Carstone!\n\nEven stronger testimony to the good qualities of Allan Woodcourt is borne\nby Mr. Jarndyce. Allan, says that gentleman, is \"a man whose hopes and\naims may sometimes lie (as most men's sometimes do, I dare say) above the\nordinary level, but to whom the ordinary level will be high enough after\nall, if it should prove to be a way of usefulness and good service leading\nto no other. All generous spirits are ambitious, I suppose; but the\nambition that calmly trusts itself to such a road, instead of\nspasmodically trying to fly over it, is the kind I care for. It is\nWoodcourt's kind.\" The love passages of this estimable young man with the\nequally estimable Esther Summerson, one of Dickens' most charming\npresentments of English maidenhood, are very pleasing, and none of them\nmore so than one which occurs towards the close of the story.\n\nThere is another medical character in one of the Christmas stories which,\ngood as it is, might have been made better but for the extent to which the\nexigencies of space limited the author in the development of character in\nthat class of stories. I mean Dr. Jeddler, the genial but mistaken father\nof Grace and Marion, in \"The Battle of Life.\" The doctor is \"a great\nphilosopher, and the heart and mystery of his philosophy was to look upon\nthe world as a gigantic practical joke; as something too absurd to be\nconsidered seriously by any practical man. His system of belief had been\nin the beginning part and parcel of the battle ground on which he lived.\"\nHe is not of the cynical school, but a modern Democritus, whose\ninclination to laugh at everything on the surface of the ocean of life was\nirresistible, while there was nothing in the conditions of his existence\nto suggest anything that was beneath. When he hears his daughters\nconversing about their lovers, \"his reflections as he looked after them,\nand heard the purport of their discourse, were limited at first to certain\nmerry meditations on the folly of all loves and likings, and the idle\nimposition practised on themselves by young people who believe for a\nmoment that there could be anything serious in such bubbles, and were\nalways deceived--always.\"\n\nDr. Jeddler is a widower; we are not told what his experiences of married\nlife had been. Had they been unhappy, one would suppose that he would have\nbeen more disposed to be cynical and pessimistic than to regard life's\nincidents as provocative of merriment, yet, if they had been happy, why\nshould he have regarded the engagement of Grace as an idle folly, a bubble\non life's surface, soon to burst? Dickens' explanation is, from this point\nof view, scarcely satisfactory. \"He was sorry,\" says the novelist, \"for\nher sake--sorry for them both--that life should be such a very ridiculous\nbusiness as it was. The doctor never dreamed of inquiring whether his\nchildren, or either of them, helped in any way to make the scheme a\nserious one. But then he was a philosopher. A kind and generous man by\nnature, he had stumbled by chance over that common philosopher's stone\n(much more easily discovered than the object of the alchemist's\nresearches) which sometimes trips up kind and generous men, and has the\nfatal property of turning gold to dross, and every precious thing to poor\naccount.\"\n\nBut when sorrow had humbled the doctor's heart, he felt that the world in\nwhich some love, deep-anchored, is the portion of every human creature,\nwas more serious than he had thought it, and understood \"how such a trifle\nas the absence of a little unit in the great absurd account had stricken\nhim to the ground.\" Then, when he and his daughters are again together in\nthe old home, and his arms are about them both, we find him acknowledging\nthat \"It's a world full of hearts, and a serious world with all its\nfolly,--even with mine, which was enough to swamp the whole world.\"\n\nIt is to be observed, however, that while we find all the traits and\nincidents of professional life in the lawyers of Dickens' creation, there\nis little or nothing of the kind in his doctors. Such traits are abundant\nin his presentments of Tulkinghorn, and Kenge, and Vholes in Wickfield,\nand many others that might be named; but they are so completely absent\nfrom his portrayals of Allan Woodcourt and Dr. Jeddler, that the two men\nmight as well have been of any other profession, without any loss to the\nstories in which they appear. If we compare them with his lawyers, or with\nthe clergymen of Mrs. Oliphant, we are struck at once with the difference.\n\n[Illustration: CHARLES DICKENS.]\n\nThis is not the case, however, when from the full-blown medical\npractitioner, adding to his name the initials M.D. or M.R.C.S., we descend\nto the \"sawbones in training,\" as the facetious Sam Weller designates the\nyoung men qualifying themselves for the exercise of the profession by\n\"walking the hospitals.\" The medical students of the novelist's early\ndays were--it would perhaps be fairer to say that a large proportion of\nthem were--a turbulent and disorderly element in the social life of the\nmetropolis. The newspapers of the day record their frequent appearances at\nthe Bow Street and Marlborough Street police-courts on charges of rowdyism\nin the streets at or after midnight, when they came out from their\nfavourite places of amusement, the Coal Hole, in the Strand, the Cider\nCellars, in Maiden Lane, and the Judge and Jury Club, in Leicester Square,\nthe latter presided over by Renton Nicholson, who edited a vile\npublication called _The Town_. Their after-amusements were found in\nstrolling through the streets in threes and fours, singing at the top of\ntheir voices comic songs, that often outraged propriety, ringing door\nbells, and chaffing the police. Dickens must often in his reporting days\nhave witnessed the next morning appearances of these young men at Bow\nStreet police-court.\n\nThe first appearance of two specimens of this variety of the immature\nmedico in the humorous pages of the \"Pickwick Papers\" is described as\nfollows in the low cockney vernacular of Sam Weller. \"One on 'em,\" he\ntells Mr. Pickwick, \"has got his legs on the table, and is a-drinkin'\nbrandy neat, vile the tother one--him in the barnacles--has got a barrel\nof oysters atween his knees, vich he's a-openin' like steam, and as fast\nas he eats 'em he takes a aim with the shells at young Dropsy, who's\na-sittin' down fast asleep in the chimbley corner.\" The latter gentleman\nis Mr. Benjamin Allen, who is described by the novelist as \"a coarse,\nstout, thick-set young man, with black hair cut rather short, and a white\nface cut rather long. He was embellished with spectacles, and wore a white\nneckerchief. Below his single-breasted black surtout, which was buttoned\nup to his chin, appeared the usual number of pepper-and-salt coloured\nlegs, terminating in a pair of imperfectly polished boots. Although his\ncoat was short in the sleeves, it disclosed no vestige of a linen\nwristband, and although there was quite enough of his face to admit of the\nencroachment of a shirt-collar, it was not graced by the smallest approach\nto that appendage. He presented altogether rather a mildewy appearance,\nand emitted a fragrant odour of full-flavoured Cubas.\"\n\nThis gentleman's companion is Mr. Bob Sawyer, \"who was habited in a coarse\nblue coat which, without being either a great-coat or a surtout, partook\nof the nature and qualities of both,\" and \"had about him that sort of\nslovenly smartness and swaggering gait which is peculiar to young\ngentlemen who smoke in the streets by day, shout and scream in the same by\nnight, call waiters by their Christian names, and do various other acts\nand deeds of an equally facetious description. He wore a pair of plaid\ntrousers and a large rough double-breasted waistcoat: out of doors he\ncarried a thick stick with a big top. He eschewed gloves, and looked, upon\nthe whole, something like a dissipated Robinson Crusoe.\" The conversation\nof these budding surgeons is perfectly in harmony with their outward\naspect. Their discourse, when it assumes a serious character, is of the\n\"cases\" at the hospital and the \"subjects\" at the time being on the\ndissecting tables of the anatomical lecture-rooms. When relieved from\nattendance at the hospitals, they lounge at tavern bars, and flirt with\nbarmaids and waitresses, to whom their attentions are not unfrequently of\nan objectionable character, and less agreeable than they imagine them to\nbe.\n\nThe contrast between the graphic power displayed by Dickens in his\ndelineation of the characters of Bob Sawyer and Ben Allen, and the\nindistinctiveness, as to profession, of his presentments of Allan\nWoodcourt and Dr. Jeddler, may help us to understand the causes which\nrender his doctors so much less effective than his lawyers. The legal\nprofession presents more variety than the medical, and comes before us\nmore prominently in conjunction with incidents of a striking character, as\nmay be seen every day in the newspaper records of the courts of law and of\npolice. The physician and the surgeon stand as much apart, in these\nrespects, from the busy barrister or solicitor as the clergy do. Dickens\nhas not given us a clerical portrait, and probably for a similar reason.\nMrs. Oliphant, on the other hand, excels in her delineations of every\ngrade of the Anglican hierarchy; but her genius as a writer of fiction\nruns in a groove essentially different from that of Dickens.\n\n\n\n\nFamous Literary Doctors.\n\nBY CUMING WALTERS.\n\n\nMedical men have not so commonly made literature an extra pursuit, or\nadopted it as a serious calling, as have the members of the other liberal\nprofessions. It is quite expected that a clergyman should write poems,\nphilosophical essays, and perhaps even a novel with a purpose; and it is\nusual to recruit the ranks of critics extensively from the law, and to\ntrust to briefless barristers for a continuous supply of romances. No\ndetail is more frequently discovered in the biographies of eminent authors\nthan that they were called to the Bar, and either never practised or\nforsook practising in order to engage in literary labours. Indeed, it\nmight almost seem that failure in law was the most important step towards\nsuccess in authorship. No such rule applies, however, to medical men, and\nno such comment would be justified in their case. Not only do we find the\nwriting of books--otherwise than text-books and technical\ntreatises--rarer with them, but it curiously happens that in most\ninstances it has been the successful practitioner, not the man walking the\nhospitals or waiting for calls, who has turned author. And we shall find\nthat these medico-literati (if I may coin the phrase) have often been\namong the most hard-working in their profession, and the wonder is that\nthey were able to enter upon a second pursuit and to follow it with so\nmuch zeal. For, in most of the examples I shall advance, literature was\nmore than a pastime with these men who indulged in it. It was chosen by\nsome for its lucrativeness, and by the majority for its capacity to\nenhance their reputation or to bring them enduring fame. This much may be\nsafely said, that the names of many excellent doctors would have faded\nfrom public remembrance ere this, and would have passed away with the\ngeneration to which they belonged, had not literature given them lasting\nluminance. In not a few instances the fact is already forgotten or wholly\nignored that certain successful writers once wrote \"M.D.\" after their\nnames. Who cares that the author of that classic \"Religio Medici\" took his\ndegrees at Leyden and at Oxford, and dispensed medicine to the end of his\nlife? Who cares that the author of \"The Borough,\" \"Tales in Verse,\" and\n\"The Parish Register,\" was apprenticed to a surgeon? Who cares that the\nwriter of such dramas as \"Virginius,\" \"William Tell,\" and \"The Hunchback,\"\nwas trained for a physician? Who cares that the author of \"Roderick\nRandom,\" \"Peregrine Pickle,\" and \"The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker\" was\na surgeon's assistant and acted as surgeon's mate in the unfortunate\nCarthagena expedition, before trying (unsuccessfully) to obtain a practice\nin London? And, above all, who cares that the author of \"The Deserted\nVillage\" and \"The Vicar of Wakefield\" studied physic in Edinburgh and on\nthe Continent, and, as Boswell was informed, \"was enabled to pursue his\ntravels on foot, partly by demanding at Universities to enter the lists as\na disputant, by which, according to the custom of many of them, he was\nentitled to the premium of a crown, when luckily for him his challenge was\nnot accepted?\" Such are a few of the examples which immediately occur to\nthe mind when the whole subject is contemplated.\n\nIt would be impossible in the compass of a short article to deal\nsystematically and comprehensively with doctors who became authors, or to\nmake out a complete list of their names with an account of the works which\nentitled them to the designation. Any facts now adduced must be considered\narbitrary and capricious, so far as the choice of them is concerned; and\nsequence is so little attempted that the reader will pardon, I trust, a\npossible leap from Galen to Goldsmith, from Sir Thomas Browne to Tobias\nSmollett, and from Sir John Blackmore to Conan Doyle. I put aside those\nmembers of the profession who have simply written on professional\nsubjects. Their name is legion, but in the great majority of cases such\nwork as this would not strictly justify their inclusion among the\nliterati. And, on the other hand, we cannot find a place in the category\nfor such men as Goethe or Sainte-Beuve, for though both studied\nmedicine, it seems to have been purely with a view to the extension of\ntheir knowledge and not with any more practical or material object.\nSainte-Beuve, it is true, for a short time in his youth entertained some\nthought of adopting the profession; but Goethe only dipped into the\nsubject with the same spirit that he dipped into experimental chemistry\nand astrology.\n\nLet us, then, refer to a few types certain of instant recognition. The\nmost notable of modern instances is Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, a\nspecialist in his profession, a hard-working physician, and the author of\nvaluable treatises on medical art, who nevertheless occupied the position\nof being among the four chief poets whom America has produced, and one of\nthe most versatile of the litterateurs of the century. He went to the\nParis Medical Schools shortly after he had graduated at Harvard; he\npractised as a physician at Boston; and for nearly forty years he was\nProfessor of Physiology. Yet he had time to write the most delightful and\noriginal of philosophical essays, to publish novels of which at least\none--\"Elsie Venner: A Romance of Destiny\"--will rank as a classic; to\ndeliver orations and after-dinner speeches in sparkling verse, and to\nwrite exquisite poems in rich and felicitous language on a wonderful\nvariety of themes, the complete collection of which makes a very\nsubstantial volume. In all his work Dr. Holmes showed himself to be the\nprofound student of nature and of humanity with many varying interests;\nyet we can often trace the hand of the physician in the work of the\nessayist and poet. His novels were special studies which only the ardent\nphysiologist and metaphysician would have cared to discuss, or, at all\nevents, would have discussed so well. Both \"Elsie Venner\" and \"The\nGuardian Angel\" deal with the occult problems of heredity, and those\nproblems are treated with the power of the specialist in certain branches\nof science. Still more strongly is the character of the medical man\ndisplayed in a number of the poems, some by reason of their subject, and\nsome by the figures and imagery they contain. The well-known \"Stethoscope\nSong\" will immediately suggest itself in illustration. But, for purposes\nof quotation, I prefer a less popular poem of rare beauty, which more\nstrikingly manifests the writer's power of transmuting the hard dry facts\nof science into light and gleaming poetry. I refer to what he called at\nfirst \"The Anatomist's Hymn,\" but afterwards \"The Living Temple.\" It is\none of the interpolated poems in the \"Autocrat\" series of papers, and to\nmy thinking invests the human body and its physical functions with\nunimagined charms.\n\nTake, for instance, this poetic exposition of our respiration, the\nscientific correctness and exactness of which need no explanation to\nreaders of this volume:--\n\n    \"The smooth, soft air with pulse-like waves\n    Flows murmuring through its hidden caves,\n    Whose streams of brightening purple rush\n    Fired with a new and livelier blush,\n    While all their burden of decay\n    The ebbing current steals away,\n    And red with Nature's flame they start\n    From the warm fountains of the heart.\n\n    No rest that throbbing slave may ask,\n    For ever quivering o'er his task,\n    While far and wide a crimson jet\n    Leaps forth to fill the woven net\n    Which in unnumbered crossing tides\n    The flood of burning life divides,\n    Then kindling each decaying part\n    Creeps back to find the throbbing heart.\n\n    But warmed with that unchanging flame\n    Behold the outward moving frame,\n    Its living marbles jointed strong\n    With glistening band and silvery thong,\n    And linked to reason's guiding reins\n    By myriad rings in trembling chains,\n    Each graven with the threaded zone\n    Which claims it as the master's own.\"\n\nThere is an almost irresistible temptation to linger over Dr. Oliver\nWendell Holmes' books, so intensely interesting is his personality and so\nfascinating is his work. But several other eminent poets of the\nprofession demand attention. To Crabbe's connection with surgery I have\nalready incidentally referred, and inasmuch as he early abandoned the\ncalling for the ministry, little need be said except that his youthful\nexperience may have aided him in writing a scathing denunciation of the\nQuack, who believed wholly in the potence of \"oxymel of squills,\" and of\nthe Parish Doctor, who \"first insults the victim whom he kills.\" The poet\nwas a severe castigator, and was never less forbearing with the lash than\nwhen these impostors of his day were under his hand for flagellation. In\nMark Akenside we come to a better specimen of the class which we are\nconsidering. At the age of twenty he went to Leyden, and three years later\nbecame, (as Dr. Johnson writes) \"a doctor of physick, having, according to\nthe custom of the Dutch Universities, published a thesis.\" In the same\nyear he published \"The Pleasures of the Imagination,\" his greatest work.\nThis was followed by a collection of odes, but he still sought a\nlivelihood as a physician. Little success attended him, however, and Dr.\nJohnson records that Akenside was known as a poet better than as a doctor,\nand would have been reduced to great exigencies but for the generosity of\nan ardent friend. \"Thus supported, he gradually advanced in medical\nreputation, but never attained any great extent of practice, or eminence\nof popularity. A physician in a great city,\" his biographer continues\nmusingly, \"seems to be the mere play-thing of Fortune; his degree of\nreputation is, for the most part, totally casual; they that employ him,\nknow not his excellence; they that reject him, know not his deficiency.\"\nYet it was otherwise with Sir Samuel Garth, doctor and poet, of whom\nJohnson himself records that \"by his conversation and accomplishments he\nobtained a very extensive practice.\" His principal poem was \"The\nDispensary,\" relating to a controversy of the time between the College of\nPhysicians, who desired to give gratuitous advice to the poor, and the\nApothecaries, who wished to keep up the high price of medicine. Garth was\n\"on the side of charity against the intrigues of interest, and of regular\nlearning against licentious usurpation of medical authority,\" as Johnson\nput it; and he sprang into favour, was eventually knighted, and became\nphysician-general to the army. His last literary work, and his worst, was\na crude but ostentatious preface to a translation of Ovid. As a matter of\nfact his writing was invariably mediocre, and Pope, in calling attention\nto the fact that the \"Dispensary\" poem had been corrected in every\nedition, unkindly remarked that \"every change was an improvement.\" John\nPhillips, who may be ranked among the physicians, though it is doubtful\nwhether he practised, enjoyed a better fate as a man of letters than did\neither Akenside or Garth. He sprang into sudden popularity by the\npublication of a whimsical and clever medley called \"The Silver Shilling,\"\nand this he followed up by a sort of official commemoration of the victory\nof Blenheim. His greatest achievement was a poem in two books on \"Cider,\"\nand he was meditating an epic on \"The Last Day\" when he died, at the early\nage of thirty-three. One curious fact about his writings, small as it is,\nis worthy of mention. He sang the praises of tobacco in every poem he\nwrote, except that on Blenheim.\n\nDr. Johnson did not rate Phillips very highly; he said that what study\ncould confer he obtained, but that \"natural deficience cannot be\nsupplied.\" The sturdy doctor, however, did his utmost to rehabilitate the\ndamaged reputation of Blackmore, whom we may regard as the most\nremarkable of all the compounds of physician-poets with whom we can become\nacquainted. Blackmore obtained an undeserved success, which was followed\nby unmerited ridicule, and Johnson, who hated every form of injustice,\nconstituted himself his champion. For the truth about Blackmore we must\nseek the medium between the extremes of Johnson's praise and of the\ncensure of his enemies--the \"malignity of contemporary wits,\" as Boswell\ntermed it. When all is said and done the fact remains that Blackmore was a\nman of uncommon character, and a prodigious worker. His first work, a\nheroic poem in ten books, on Prince Arthur, was written, he related, by\n\"such catches and starts, and in such occasional uncertain hours as his\nprofession afforded, and for the greatest part in coffee-houses, or in\npassing up and down the streets.\" This work passed through several\neditions with rapidity, and two extra books were added to it. The King\nknighted him and gave him other advances, but the critics furiously\nassailed him, and his name became a by-word for all that was heavy and\nridiculous in poetry. Notwithstanding this he persevered, and published\nsuccessively a \"Paraphrase on the Book of Job,\" a \"Satire on Wit,\"\n\"Elijah,\"--an epic poem in ten books--\"Creation, a Philosophical Poem,\"\n\"Advice to Poets how to celebrate the Duke of Marlborough,\" \"The Nature of\nMan,\" \"Redemption,\" \"A New Version of the Psalms,\" \"Alfred\"--an epic in\ntwelve books--\"A History of the Conspiracy against King William,\" and a\nhost of others which his perverted reason or fantastic fancy suggested.\nNever, perhaps, was known such a voluminous author, or one so erratic in\nhis system. What with his long heroic poems, his treatises on smallpox and\nother diseases, his theological controversies, his \"Advices\" to painters,\npoets, and weavers, and his prose contributions to periodical\npublications, \"England's Arch-Poet\" (as Swift described him) could never\nhave idled away an hour. Of all that he wrote, a few passages from his\n\"Arthur\" and \"Creation\" are alone remembered, and but for Johnson's\ngood-natured attempt to save him from oblivion, his name would only have\nlived in the satires of his remorseless critics. One saying of Blackmore's\nonly is worth noting here. He had laid himself open to the imputation of\ndespising learning, and Dr. Johnson himself thought him a shallow ill-read\nman. But Blackmore said:--\"I only undervalued false or superficial\nlearning, that signifies nothing for the service of mankind; as to physic\nI expressly affirmed that learning must be joined with native genius to\nmake a physician of the first rank; but if those talents are separated, I\nasserted, and do still insist, that a man of native sagacity and diligence\nwill prove a more able and useful practiser than a heavy notional scholar\nencumbered with a heap of confused ideas.\"\n\nOne or two other doctors who in their time enjoyed a reputation as\nwriters, but whose fame was transient, or, at least, is insecure, call for\nvery brief notice before we pass on to a few of greater importance. Sir\nJohn Hill, M.D., an eighteenth century physician, was a fairly extensive\nlitterateur, and in addition to producing treatises on botany, medicine,\nnatural history, and philosophy, wrote half a dozen novels, and several\ndramas. His _chef d'oeuvre_ was \"The Vegetable System,\" a work of such\nmagnitude that it ran to twenty-six volumes, a copy of which was presented\nto the King of Sweden, and procured for the author the distinction of\nbeing included in the Order of the Polar Star. Dr. William Fullarton\nCumming, a son of Burns' \"Bonnie Leslie,\" was compelled to travel in mild\nclimates for his health, and as a result wrote \"The Notes of a Wanderer,\"\na work abounding in poetic descriptions of the charming scenery of the\nEast. He tells us that the real pleasure of travelling is not to boast of\nhow many lions one may have slain in a single day, but to saunter about\nwithout an object, to inhale the moral atmosphere of places visited, to\nenter bazaars, not to buy, but to catch the hundred peculiarities of a new\npeople, to stray hither and thither watching the work and the recreations\nof other races. John Chalmers, M.D. (not to be confused with the great\ndivine, Dr. Thomas Chalmers), also deserves to be noted as a very graceful\nwriter of romantic stories; and Sir Henry Thompson, under the name of \"Pen\nOliver,\" produced some years ago a strange little volume which enjoyed a\nseason's success--\"Charley Kingston's Aunt.\"\n\nThat most diffident and most delightful of authors, Dr. John Brown, who\ngave us the memorable \"Rab and his Friends,\" was in practice at Edinburgh.\nAs long as lovers of the animal creation are to be found, the story of Rab\nand of Marjorie will be read; and these sketches of brutes whom he almost\nhumanised will probably outlive the genial doctor's more ambitious \"Horae\nSubsecivae\" and \"John Leech and other Papers.\" Of a very different nature\nwas the author of \"Ten Thousand a Year,\" Dr. Samuel Warren, physician,\nlawyer, politician, novelist, and office-seeker. Tittlebat Titmouse is not\nmuch studied now, for the type is out-of-date, and the society of which\nthe novel treats, the abuses prevalent, the general corruption which\nprevailed in public life, were exposures intended for a past generation.\nYet there are passages in the work which should save it from absolute\nneglect, and it has for over half a century kept its author's name alive.\nThis is more than his \"Passages from the Diary of a late Physician\" could\nhave done, or those dozen other works with the bare titles of which the\npresent reading public is scarcely acquainted. John Abercrombie, the chief\nconsulting physician in Scotland during the last century, sought and\nachieved literary fame with two volumes on \"The Intellectual Powers,\" and\n\"The Moral Feelings.\" They enjoyed a popularity scarcely commensurate with\ntheir actual merits.\n\nDavid Macbeth Moir, who faithfully performed the arduous duties of a\nmedical practitioner in Edinburgh, and whose life was almost wholly\ndevoted to the service of his fellows, was the famous \"Delta\" of\n_Blackwood's Magazine_. His poems, some four hundred of which he\ncontributed to \"Maga.\" alone, are out of fashion now, though their\ndelightful vein of reflectiveness and their charm of expression should\npreserve them from absolute neglect. The heavy labours of his profession\ndid not seem to check his literary productiveness. His poems fill two\nlarge volumes; his prose works are by no means meagre or unimportant, and\nhis \"Sketches of the Poetical Literature of the past Half-century,\" is a\nstandard work on the poetry of his period. Medical treatises, too, came\nfrom his pen; and his \"Life of Mansie Wauch, Tailor,\" is one of the most\nagreeable of genuine Scotch sketches. His biographer correctly summed up\nthe merits of the worthy doctor as a literary worker in the words \"Good\nsound sense, a simple healthy feeling, excited and exalted though these\nmay be, never fail him. He draws from nature, and from himself direct.\"\nQuiet humour and simple pathos, a love of humanity, deep reverential\nfeeling, and originality of thought--all these are found in \"Delta's\"\nwritings, and serve, with his own admirable nature, to keep his memory\ngreen.\n\nOf Dr. Conan Doyle, the most conspicuous instance of the hour of the\ndoctor turned author, no detailed notice is requisite, as the main facts\nof his career are sufficiently well known, and his literary work promises\nto bring him both fame and fortune. Undoubtedly he exemplifies the fact\nthat the medical hand can scarcely be concealed when it takes to the pen,\nfor his novels and stories abound in allusions which only his study,\ntraining, and experience as a doctor could suggest. His reading and\nobservation largely provide the technique of his romances. Something of\nthe same could be said of Smollett's work, though the medical knowledge of\nthe author was often turned to less agreeable account. In fact, most of\nSmollet's references on this score were the reverse of delectable, and I\nrefrain from a more precise examination of them. The unexpected use to\nwhich Mr. R. D. Blackmore has turned his knowledge of medicine--for he\nstudied medicine as well as law seriously in his youth--in several of his\nnovels, notably in the last, \"Perlycross,\" has excited much interest and\nattention among the profession. So marked is this that I cannot refrain\nquoting from a singularly interesting criticism penned by a leading\nphysician in the Midlands. \"The medical incidents in 'Perlycross,'\" he\nsays, \"are pourtrayed with an accuracy which shows an intimate knowledge\nof the profession and its members.... No doubt the opinions expressed by\none learned doctor were those of the time represented in the story, though\nthey could hardly be received with justice in the present day. Speaking of\nthe illness of Sir Thomas Waldron, he says (p. 18):--'At present such a\ncase could be dealt with best in Paris, although we have young men rising\nnow who will make it otherwise before very long.' The key to this\ndifficulty is found later on (p. 159) where the technical word\n'introsusception' is mentioned as the disease or condition from which the\npatient suffered. At the time spoken of Parisian surgeons, headed by the\neminent Dupuytren, excelled in the art of surgery; at the present time\nsuch a case could be treated as well by any hospital surgeon in England as\nin the metropolis of France.... The book contains an admirably-described\ncase of catalepsy, which is equally well explained. The cure of the\nattack is described with consummate skill and power. The keystone of the\nwhole position of medical knowledge is contained in a few words towards\nits close. In these days of rapid transition from one excitement to\nanother it would be well to take the lesson to heart, and to remember what\nthe author speaks of as two fine things--'If you wish to be sure of\nanything see it with your own good eyes,' and the second, 'Never scamp\nyour work.' How these sayings may be applied in the practice of the\nprofession may with profit be learned from a perusal of the pages of\n'Perlycross.'\" Perhaps I am going too far in claiming Mr. Blackmore as a\nmedical man who has taken to literature, but the excuse of his early\ntraining, combined with this curious result of it manifested in his\nwriting, proves irresistible.\n\nNot to stray, however, but to get our feet once more upon solid ground, we\nmay refer to a classic example, with which this article, had it been aught\nelse but discursive, should have begun. Galen, the Greek physician, must\nbe counted among the first and most famous of his class who have written\nliterary works. He was so voluminous a writer on philosophical subjects\nthat scores of books on logic and ethics have been fathered upon him\nwithout much question arising as to the unlikelihood of his being the\nauthor of so many. As it is he is credited with eighty-three treatises,\nthe genuineness of which is not disputed; there are nineteen suspected to\nbear his name unjustly, forty-five are proved to be spurious, and then\nthere remain a further fifteen fragments and fifteen commentaries on\nHippocrates, which may be accepted as his in part or whole. He made\nhimself master of the medical, physiological, and scientific knowledge of\nhis time. He was born in 130 A.D., and died in 201, and left a record of\nthat period. In addition to preparing this massive work, he seems to have\nfound time to devote himself to various branches of philosophy with such\nsuccess that later writers were well pleased to trade with the talisman of\nhis name. Were it worth while to go back to antiquity, and to the history\nof foreign nations for further examples of physicians whose writings were\nnot confined to expositions of the medical system, Averrhoes, most famous\nof Arabian philosophers, and physician to the calif, a master of the\ntwelfth century, would occupy a prominent position. But it is more to our\npurpose to draw attention to the remarkable career, and one that deserves\nto be held in remembrance, of Arthur Johnston, physician to King Charles\nthe First. In the same year that he graduated at the university of Padua\n(1610) he was \"laureated poet at Paris, and that most deservedly,\" as Sir\nThomas Urquhart recorded. He was then only three-and-twenty years of age,\nand the prospect of many years being before him, he indulged in extensive\ntravel, and visited in turn most of the principal foreign seats of\nlearning. His journeying over, he settled in France and became equally\nwell known as a physician and as a writer of excellent Latin verse. A\ncourteous act, characteristic of the time, secured him the favour and\npatronage of the English royal family, for in 1645 he published an elegy\non James I., and followed this up by dedicating a Latin rendering of the\nSong of Solomon to King Charles. Other specimens of his rare culture and\nhis poetical powers were forthcoming, and he achieved a European\nreputation. His Latin translation of the Psalms is held to be unexcelled\nby any other, unless it be Buchanan's, and the fact that his translation\nis still in use sufficiently attests its excellence and value. He died\nsuddenly in 1641, while on a visit to Oxford, and in the centuries which\nhave succeeded he has not been displaced in the front rank of refined and\ndeeply versed Latin scholars and poets.\n\nIt would be a matter of considerable difficulty to make a complete list of\nliterary doctors, but enough has perhaps been written to show that they\nare no small band so far as numbers go, and that their influence in the\nworld of books has been very considerable and distinguished. We owe to\nthem many great works of enduring repute, of value to the student, of\nperpetual entertainment to the general reader. When, too, we consider the\nwillingness and the zeal with which the writing members of the medical\nprofession have imparted their knowledge, we are led to believe that they\naccepted as their motto the noble utterance of Sir Thomas Browne, the\nchief of literary doctors:--\"To be reserved and caitiff in goodness is the\nsordidest piece of covetousness, and more contemptible than pecuniary\nAvarice. To this (as calling myself a Scholar) I am obliged by the duty of\nmy condition: I make not therefore my head a grave, but a treasure of\nknowledge; I intend no Monopoly, but a community, in learning; I study\nnot for my own sake only, but for theirs that study not for themselves. I\nenvy no man that knows more than myself, but pity them that know less. I\ninstruct no man as an exercise of my knowledge, or with an intent rather\nto nourish and keep it alive in mine own head than beget and propagate it\nin his; and in the midst of all my endeavours there is but one thought\nthat dejects me, that my acquired parts must perish with myself, nor can\nbe Legacied among my honoured Friends.\"\n\n\n\n\nThe \"Doctor\" in time of Pestilence.\n\nBY WILLIAM E. A. AXON, F.R.S.L.\n\n    \"I do not feel in me those sordid and unchristian desires of my\n    profession; I do not secretly implore and wish for Plagues, rejoice at\n    Famines, revolve Ephemerides and Almanacks in expectation of malignant\n    Aspects, fatal Conjunctions, and Eclipses.\"--SIR THOMAS BROWNE'S\n    \"Religio Medici,\" pt. ii., sec. ix.\n\n\nOf the great epidemics which have from time to time devastated Europe,\nGreat Britain has had its full share. Between 664 and 1665 there were many\nvisitations, resulting in heavy mortality, to which the general name of\nplague or pestilence has been given, although they were not always\nidentical in form. Often the dread sisters Famine and Pestilence went hand\nin hand in the domains of merrie England in the good old times.\n\nThe Statute of Labourers declares, no doubt with perfect truth, that \"a\ngreat part of the people, principally of artisans and labourers,\" died in\nthe pestilence known as the Black Death of 1349, which had important\nconsequences, socially and politically. There were many subsequent\noutbreaks, though they fortunately did not attain to the enormous\nproportions of the great mortality. We have from the graphic hand of\nChaucer a life-like portrait of a medical man of the fourteenth century\nwho had gained his money in the time of pestilence.\n\nAt the end of the fifteenth and middle of the sixteenth century, we have\nas alternating with bubo plague, the _Sudor Anglicanus_. Its appearance\ncoincided with the invasion by which Richard III. lost his crown, and his\nrival became Henry VII. Dr. Thomas Forrester, who was in London during the\noutbreak of 1485, gives instances of suddenness with which the \"sweat\"\nbecame fatal. \"We saw two prestys standing togeder and speaking togeder,\nand we saw both of them die suddenly.\" The symptoms were sweating, bad\nodour, redness, thirst, headache, \"and some had black spots as it appeared\nin our frere Alban, a noble leech, on whose soul God have mercy.\"\nForrester complains of the quacks who put letters on poles and on church\ndoors, promising to help the people in their need. He lays stress upon\nastrological causes, but does not overlook the defective sanitation which\ngave the plague some of its firm hold. The _Sudor Anglicanus_ returned in\n1508, 1517, 1528, and 1551. The last visitation was the occasion of a\ntreatise by the worthy Cambridge founder, to whom Gonville and Caius\nCollege owes so much.\n\n\"The Boke of Jhon Caius aganst the sweatyng Sickness\" is an interesting\ndocument. It opens with a long autobiographical passage as to his previous\nliterary labours, which have ranged from medicine to theology. At first he\nwrote in English, but afterwards in Latin and Greek. The reason for this\nchange is stated. \"Sence y{t} that tyme diverse other thynges I have\nwritten, but with the entente never more to write in the Englishe tongue\npartly because the comodite of that which is so written, passeth not the\ncompasse of Englande, but remaineth enclosed within the seas, and partly\nbecause I thought that labours so taken should be halfe lost among them\nwhich set not by learnyng. Thirdly, for that I thought it best to auoide\nthe judgment of the multitude from whom in maters of lernyng a man shal be\nforced to dissente, in disprouyng that which they most approue, and\napprouyng that which they most disalowe. Fourthly for that the common\nsettyng furthe and printig of every foolishe thyng in englishe, both of\nphisicke vnperfectly and other matters vndiscretly diminishe the grace of\nthynges learned set furth in thesame. But chiefely because I would geve\nnone example or comfort to my countrie men (who I would to be now, as here\ntofore they have been, comparable in learnyng to men of other countries)\nto stande onely in the Englishe tongue, but to leaue the simplicitie of\nthe same, and to procede further in many and diuerse knowledges both in\ntongues and sciences at home and in uniuersities, to the adornyng of the\ncomon welthe, better service of their kyng, and great pleasure and\ncommodite of their own selues, to what kind of life so euer they should\napplie them.\" But his resolution not to write again in the vulgar tongue\nwas broken by considerations of utility, for he saw that it could not be\nvery serviceable to ordinary English people to give them advice as to the\ntreatment of the sweating sickness in a language which they did not\nunderstand. In his account of this dire malady, he lays stress upon errors\nand excess of diet as a strongly co-operating cause. \"They which had thys\nsweat sore with perille or death, were either men of welthe, ease and\nwelfare, or of the poorer sorte such as wer idls persones, good ale\ndrinkers, and Tauerne haunters. For these, by ye great welfare of the one\nsorte, and large drinkyng of thother, heped up in their bodies moche evill\nmatter: by their ease and idlenes, coulde not waste and consume it.\"\nAgainst the infection of bad air he recommends avoiding carrion \"kepyng\nCanelles cleane\" and other general sanitary precautions. He suggests that\nthe midsummer bonfires were intended for purging the air, \"and not onely\nfor vigils.\" Rosewater and other perfumes are to be used, and he thinks it\nwould be well to clear the house of its rushes and dust. It is to be\nfeared that the rushes which served instead of carpets, even in great\nhouses, were not renewed very frequently. The handkerchief was to be\nperfumed, and the patient was to have in his mouth \"a pece either of\nsetwel, or of the rote of _enula campana_ wel steped before in vinegre\nrosate, a mace, or berie of Juniper.\"\n\nDr. Caius, like Dr. Forrester, did not omit to warn his readers that even\nwith the aid of his book a medical man was still necessary, and in doing\nso he gives us a glimpse of the quack doctors of the sixteenth century.\n\"Therefore seke you out a good Phisicien, and knowen to haue skille, and\nat the leaste be so good to your bodies, as you are to your hosen or shoes\nfor the wel-making or mending wherof, I doubt not but you wil diligently\nsearche out who is knowe to be the best hosier or shoemaker in the place\nwhere you dwelle: and flie the unlearned as a pestilence to the comune\nwealth. As simple women, carpenters, pewterers, brasiers, sope ball\nsellers, pulters, hostellers, painters, apotecaries (otherwise then for\ntheir drogges), auaunters theselves to come from Pole, Constantiple,\nItalie, Almaine, Spaine, Fraunce, Grece, and Turkie, Inde, Egipt or Jury:\nfrom y{e} seruice of Emperoures, kinges, and quienes, promisig helpe of al\ndiseases, yea vncurable, with one or two drinckes, by waters sixe monethes\nin continualle distillinge, by _Aurum potabile_, or _quintessence_, by\ndrynckes of great and hygh prices as though thei were made of the sune,\nmoone, or sterres, by blessynges, and Blowinges, Hipocriticalle prayenges,\nand foolysh smokynges of shirts, smockes, and kerchieffes, wyth such other\ntheire phantasies and mockeries, meaninge nothng els, but to abuse your\nlight belieue, and scorne you behind your backes with their medicines, so\nfilthie, that I am ashamed to name theim, for your single wit and simple\nbelief, in trusting the most which you know not at al, and vnderstad\nleast: like to them which thinke farre foules have faire fethers, although\nthei be never so euil fauoured & foule: as though there could not be so\nconning an Englishman, as a foolish running stranger (of others I speak\nnot) or so perfect helth by honest learning, as by deceiptfull ignorance.\"\n\nDr. Caius laid stress upon exercise as an aid to health, but some popular\ngames he thought \"rather a laming of legges than an exercise.\" We need not\nfollow him in the details of the treatment he recommends if in spite of\nthe adoption of his preventive _regime_, the sweating sickness should\ncome.\n\nIn 1561 there was issued \"A newe booke conteyninge an exortacion to the\nsicke.\" The tract ends with the following parody on the nostrums current\nfor the cure of the pestilence: \"Take a pond of good hard penaunce, and\nwashe it wel with the water of your eyes, and let it ly a good whyle at\nyoure hert. Take also of the best fyne fayth, hope, charyte yt you can\nget, a like quantite of al mixed together, your soule even full, and use\nthis confection every day in your lyfe, whiles the plages of God\nreigneth. Then, take both your handes ful of good workes commaunded of\nGod, and kepe them close in a clene conscience from the duste of vayne\nglory, and ever as you are able and se necessite so to use them. This\nmedicine was found wryten in an olde byble boke, and it hath been\npractised and proved true of mani, both men and women\" (Collier's _Bib.\nAccount_, i. 74).\n\nThe wealthy, on an outbreak of the plague, fled from the infected city, as\nwe may learn from Boccaccio, and from Miles Coverdale's translation of\nOsiander's sermon, \"How and whether a Christian man ought to flye the\nhorrible plage of the pestilence,\" which appeared in 1537.\n\nDuring the plague of London, in 1603, the physicians are asserted by\nDekker to have \"hid their synodical heads,\" but this is at all events not\nwholly true. Thomas Lodge, the poet, was also a graduate in medicine, and\nin his \"Treatise on the Plague\"--not the only one published in relation to\nthis epidemic--we are told of his experiences of the plague-stricken city.\nHe gives some good advice in relation to the sanitary measures to be taken\nfor the prevention of the plague.\n\nThe nature of the regulations devised in the Tudor times to ward off\ninfection may be gathered from the rules laid down at Chester in November,\n1574, when\n\n    \"the right Worshipful Sir John Sauage, Knight, maior of the City of\n    Chester had consideracion of the present state of the said cite\n    somewhat visited with what is called the plage, and divisinge the best\n    meanes and orderlie waies he can, with [the advice] of his Bretheren\n    the alderman, Justices of peace within the citie aforesaid (through\n    the goodness of God) to avoid the same hath with such advice, sett\n    forth ordained and appointed (amongst other) the points, articles,\n    clauses, and orders folowing, which he willeth and commandeth all\n    persons to observe and kepe, upon the severall pains theirin\n    contayned:\n\n    \"Imprimis. That no person nor persons who are or shalbe visited with\n    the said sickness, or any other who shall be of there company, shall\n    go abrode out of there houses without license of the alderman of the\n    ward such persons inhabite, And that every person soe licensed to\n    beare openlie in their hands ... three quarters long ... ense ...\n    shall goe abrode out of the ... upon paine that eny person doynge the\n    contrary to be furthwith expulsed out of the said citie.\n\n    \"2. Item if any person doe company with any persons visited, they\n    alsoe to beare ... upon like payne.\n\n    \"3. Item that none of them soe visited doe goe abroad in any part or\n    place within the citie in the night season, upon like payne.\n\n    \"4. Item that the accustomed due watche to be kepte every night,\n    within the said citie, by the inhabitants thereof.\n\n    \"5. Item the same watchman to apprehend and take up all night walkers\n    and such suspect as shalbe founde within and to bring them to the\n    Justice of peace, of that ... the gaile of the Northgate, that further\n    order may be taken with them as shall appear....\n\n    \"6. Item that no swine be kept, within the said citie nor any other\n    place, then ... side prively nor openlie after the xiii{th} daie of\n    this present moneth, upon paine of fyne and imprisonment of every\n    person doing the contrary.\n\n    \"7. Item that no donge, muck or filth, at any tyme, hearafter be caste\n    within the walls of the said citie, upon paine of ffyne and\n    imprisonment at his worships direction.\n\n    \"8. Item that no kind or sort of ... or any wares from other place be\n    brought in packs into the said citie of Chester, untill the same be\n    ffirste opened and eired without the libities of the said citie, upon\n    pain last recited.\n\n    \"9. Item that papers or writing containing this sence Lord haue mercie\n    upon us, to be fixed upon euery house, dore post, or other open place,\n    to the street of the house so infected.\n\n    \"10. Item that no person of the said citie doe suffer any their doggs\n    to goe abrode out of their houses or dwellings, upon paine that euery\n    such dogge so founde abrode shalbe presently killed. And the owners\n    thereof ponished at his worships pleasure.\"\n\nIt has always been found easier to make laws than to have them enforced,\nand we find certain inhabitants complaining of the disobedience of\ninfected persons in the following petition:--\n\n    \"To the right worshipful Sir John Savage, knight, maior of the Citie\n    of Chester, the aldermen, sheriffs, and common counsaile of the same.\n\n    \"In most humble wise complayninge sheweth unto your worships, your\n    Orators, the persons whose name are subscribed inhabiting in a certain\n    lane within the same citie called Pepper Street, That where yt haue\n    pleased God to infect divers persons of the same Street with the\n    plage, and where also for the avoidinge of further infection your\n    worships have taken order that all such so infected should observe\n    certaine good necessarye orders by your worships made and provided.\n    But so it is, right worships, that none of the said persons infected\n    do observe any of the orders by your worships in that case taken, to\n    the greate danger and perill, not only of your Orators and their\n    famelyes being in number twenty, but also of the reste of the said\n    citie, who by the sufferance of God and of his gracious goodness are\n    clere and safe from any infection of the said deceas: In consideration\n    whereof your Orators moste humbly beseche your worships for God's\n    sake, and as your worships intend it your Orators should, by the\n    sufferance of God, avoide the dangers of the said deceas with their\n    family, and also for the better safty of the citie to take such\n    directions with the said infected persons that they may clearly be\n    avoided from thens to some other convenient for the time untill God\n    shall restore them to their former health. And in this doing your\n    Orators shall daily pray, &c.\"[1]\n\nDuring the visitation of the plague at Manchester in 1645, when the place\nsuffered severely, the authorities not only provided \"cabins\" at\nCollyhurst for the reception of those whom the disease attacked, but\nengaged the services of \"Doctor Smith,\" who received L4 \"for his charges\nto London and a free guift,\" and L39 \"for part of his wages for his\nservice in the time of the visitation.\" Thos. Minshull, the apothecary,\nwas paid L6 2s. 6d. for \"stuffe for ye town's service.\" Some \"bottles and\nstuffe\" were unused at the end of the plague, and these were sold to \"Mr.\nSmith, Phissition,\" for L1.\n\nThe story of English pestilence closes with the Great Plague of London in\n1665. It began about the west end of the city, Hampstead, Highgate, and\nActon sharing the infection, and gradually worked eastward by way of\nHolborn. Out of an estimated population of 460,000 there died 97,306\npersons, of whom 68,596 perished of pestilence. One week witnessed 8,297\ndeaths, and it has been seriously argued that the official figures very\nmuch underrate the truth, and that in this week of highest mortality the\ndeaths really amounted to 12,000. \"Almost all other diseases turned to the\nplague.\" Many of the clergy fled, and the places of some were occupied by\nthe ejected Nonconformists. The complaint of absenteeism was also brought\nagainst the physicians, but there were certainly some who stayed in the\ninfected and desolate city. \"But Lord!\" says Pepys, \"what a sad time it is\nto all: no boats upon the river, and grass grown all up and down Whitehall\nCourt, and nobody but poor wretches in the street.\" William Boghurst, who\nwas an apothecary, and Nathaniel Hodges, who was a physician, each wrote\nfull accounts of the plague.\n\nHodges was the son of a vicar of Kensington, where he was born in 1629. He\nwas a King's scholar at Westminster, and was educated both at Cambridge\nand Oxford, taking his M.D. degree at the latter university in 1659. When\nthe great plague broke out he remained at his house in Walbrook, and gave\nadvice to all who sought it. There was unfortunately no lack of patients.\nHodges' writings give us a minute account of the \"doctor in the time of\npestilence.\" The first doubtful appearances of the plague were noticed by\nDr. Hodges amongst some of those who sought his counsel at the Christmas\nof 1664-5, in May and June there were some that could not be mistaken, and\nin August and September he was overwhelmed with work. He was an early\nriser, and after taking a dose of anti-pestilential electuary, he attended\nto any private business that needed immediate decision, and then went to\nhis consulting room, and for three hours received a succession of\npatients, some already ill of the plague, others only infected by fear.\nHaving disposed of these anxious inquirers, the doctor breakfasted, and\nthen began his round of visits to patients who were unable to see him at\nhome. Disinfectants were burnt on hot coals as he entered their houses,\nand he also took a lozenge. Returning home, he dined off roast meat and\npickles, prefaced and followed by sack and other wine. A second round of\nvisits did not terminate until eight or nine in the evening. He was an\nenemy of tobacco, but his dislike of the Indian weed did not extend to\nsack, which he seems to have drunk plentifully, especially perhaps on the\ntwo occasions when he thought he had himself caught the plague. These\nproved to be false alarms. Amongst the drugs he tried and found useless\nwere \"unicorn's horn\" and dried toads. The Corporation of London testified\na due sense of Hodges' services by a stipend and the position of physician\nto the city. His \"Loimologia\" is an important contribution to the\nliterature of epidemics.\n\nHodges, who had thus been a witness of the Carnival of Death in the\nmetropolis of England, may well have pondered on the words of one of his\nillustrious contemporaries, Sir Thomas Browne, who says:--\"I have not\nthose strait ligaments, or narrow obligations to the world as to dote on\nlife, or be convulst and tremble at the name of Death. Not that I am\ninsensible of the dread and horrour thereof; or by raking into the bowels\nof the deceased, continual sight of anatomies, skeletons, or cadaverous\nreliques, like vespilloes or grave makers, I am become stupid, or have\nforgot the apprehension of mortality: but that, marshalling all the\nhorrors and contemplating the extremities thereof, I find not anything\ntherein able to daunt the courage of a man, much less a well resolved\nChristian.... For a Pagan there may be some motive to be in love with\nlife; but for a Christian to be amazed at Death, I see not how he can\nescape this dilemma, that he is too sensible of this life, or hopeless of\nthe life to come.\"\n\n\n\n\nMountebanks and Medicine.\n\nBY THOMAS FROST.\n\n\nMountebanks--a name derived from the Italian words _monta in banco_,\nmounting a bench--were, in company with their attendant zanies, or \"Merry\nAndrews,\" a popular class of public entertainers down to the earlier years\nof the present century. Their chief object, however, was not to provide a\nfree entertainment, but to dispose of their nostrums to the crowds which\nthe entertainment brought together. Andrew Borde, a medical practitioner\nat Winchester, who obtained a more than local reputation, enjoying the\ndistinction of being one of the physicians of Henry VIII., is said to have\nbeen the original \"Merry Andrew.\" The story of his life is full of\ninterest, and furnishes some curious information concerning the manners of\nhis age and his class. Mr. George Roberts, who supplied Lord Macaulay with\nmuch material for his \"History of England,\" relates that Borde was a man\nof great learning, and had travelled on the continent. He made many\nastronomical calculations, which may not unfairly be supposed to have\nbeen for the purposes of astrology. He was a celibitarian and an ascetic,\ndrinking water three times a week, wearing a hair-shirt next his skin, and\nkeeping the sheet intended for his burial at the foot of his bed. As a\nmountebank, he frequented fairs, markets, and other places of public\nresort, and addressed those assembled in recommendation of his medicines.\nHe was a fluent speaker, and the witticisms with which he interspersed his\nlectures never failed to attract, obtaining for him the name of \"Merry\nAndrew.\"\n\nMountebanks flourished on the continent as well as in England, and the\n_Belphegor_ of the dramatist had many prototypes in Italy and France.\nCoryat, a little-known writer, who made the tour of Europe at the\nbeginning of the seventeenth century, and published a narrative of his\nadventures and experiences, gives a good account of the mountebanks he saw\nat Venice. \"Twice a day,\" he says, \"that is, in the morning and afternoon,\nyou may see five or six several stages erected for them.... These\nmountebanks at one end of their stage place their trunk, which is\nreplenished with a world of new-fangled trumperies. After the whole rabble\nof them has gotten up to the stage,--whereof some wear vizards like fools\nin a play, some that are women are attired with habits according to that\nperson they sustain,--the music begins; sometimes vocal, sometimes\ninstrumental, sometimes both. While the music plays, the principal\nmountebank opens his trunk and sets abroad his wares. Then he maketh an\noration to the audience of half-an-hour long, wherein he doth most\nhyperbolically extol the virtue of his drugs and confections--though many\nof them are very counterfeit and false. I often wondered at these natural\norators, for they would tell their tales with such admirable volubility\nand plausible grace, _extempore_, and seasoned with that singular variety\nof elegant jests and witty conceits, that they did often strike great\nadmiration into strangers.... He then delivereth his commodities by little\nand little, the jester still playing his part, and the musicians singing\nand playing upon their instruments. The principal things that they sell\nare oils, sovereign waters, amorous songs printed, apothecary drugs, and a\ncommonweal of other trifles. The head mountebank, every time he delivereth\nout anything, maketh an extemporal speech, which he doth eftsoons\nintermingle with such savoury jests (but spiced now and then with\nsingular scurrility), that they minister passing mirth and laughter to the\nwhole company, which may perhaps consist of a thousand people.\" The\nentertainment extended over two hours, when, having sold as many of their\nwares as they could, their properties would be removed and the stage taken\ndown.\n\nJonson, in his comedy of \"Volpone,\" presents a scene showing a\nmountebank's stage at Venice, and the discourse of the vendor of quack\nmedicines has a remarkable resemblance to the oratory of the \"Cheap Jacks\"\nof the present day, of which old play-goers may remember hearing a very\ngood imitation in the drama of \"The Flowers of the Forest.\" Says Jonson's\nmountebank: \"You all know, honourable gentlemen, I never valued this\nampulla, or vial, at less than eight crowns; but for this time I am\ncontent to be deprived of it for six: six crowns is the price, and less in\ncourtesy I know you cannot offer me. Take it or leave it, however, both it\nand I am at your service! Well! I am in a humour at this time to make a\npresent of the small quantity my coffer contains: to the rich in courtesy,\nand to the poor for God's sake. Wherefore, now mark: I asked you six\ncrowns, and six crowns at other times you have paid me; you shall not give\nme six crowns, nor five, nor four, nor three, nor two, nor one, nor half a\nducat. Sixpence it will cost you (or six hundred pounds); expect no lower\nprice, for I will not bate.\"\n\nReturning to the mountebanks of our own country, we find in the accounts\nof the Chamberlain of the Corporation of Worcester for the year 1631 the\nfollowing item:--\n\n    \"They yeald account of money by them received of mountebanks to the\n    use of the poor 58s. 9d.\"\n\nIt is suggested by Mr. John Noake, however, that these mountebanks were\nriders or posturers, and that the amount was the charge made for the\npermission accorded them to perform in the city. Later in the century, the\neccentric Earl of Rochester, on one occasion, played the mountebank on\nTower Hill, and the example was followed by more than one comedian of the\nnext century. Leveridge and Penkethman, actors well known at Bartholomew\nFair for many years, appeared at country fairs as \"Doctor Leverigo and his\nJack-Pudding Pinkanello,\" as also did Haines as \"Watho Van Claturbank,\nHigh German Doctor.\" The discourse of the latter was published as a\nbroadside, headed with an engraving representing him addressing a crowd\nfrom a stage, with a bottle of medicine in his right hand. Beside him\nstands a Harlequin, and in the rear a man with a plumed hat blows a\ntrumpet. A gouty patient occupies a high-backed arm-chair, and an array of\nboxes and bottles is seen at the back of the stage.\n\n\"Having studied Galen, Hypocrates, Albumazar, and Paracelsus,\" says the\ndiscourse thus headed, \"I am now become the Esculapius of the age; having\nbeen educated at twelve universities, and travelled through fifty-two\nkingdoms, and been counsellor to the counsellors of several monarchs. By\nthe earnest prayers and entreaties of several lords, earls, dukes, and\nhonourable personages, I have been at last prevailed upon to oblige the\nworld with this notice, that all persons, young or old, blind or lame,\ndeaf and dumb, curable or incurable, may know where to repair for cure, in\nall cephalalgias, paralytic paroxysms, palpitations of the pericardium,\nempyemas, syncopes, and nasieties; arising either from a plethory or a\ncachochymy, vertiginous vapours, hydrocephalus dysenteries, odontalgic or\npodagrical inflammations, and the entire legion of lethiferous\ndistempers.... This is Nature's palladium, health's magazine; it works\nseven manner of ways, as Nature requires, for it scorns to be confined to\nany particular mode of operation; so that it affecteth the cure either\nhypnotically, hydrotically, cathartically, poppismatically, pneumatically,\nor synedochically; it mundifies the hypogastrium, extinguishes all\nsupernatural fermentations and ebullitions, and, in fine, annihilates all\nnosotrophical morbific ideas of the whole corporeal compages. A drachm of\nit is worth a bushel of March dust; for, if a man chance to have his\nbrains beat out, or his head dropped off, two drops--I say two drops!\ngentlemen--seasonably applied, will recall the fleeting spirit,\nre-enthrone the deposed archeus, cement the discontinuity of the parts,\nand in six minutes restore the lifeless trunk to all its pristine\nfunctions, vital, natural, and animal; so that this, believe me,\ngentlemen, is the only sovereign remedy in the world. _Venienti occurite\nmorbo._--Down with your dust. _Principiis obsta._--No cure no money.\n_Quaerendo pecunia primum._--Be not sick too late.\"\n\nThe mountebanking quack flourished in great state in the first half of the\nlast century. \"A Tour through England,\" published in 1723, gives the\nfollowing account of one whom the author saw at Winchester:--\"As I was\nsitting at the George Inn, I saw a coach with six bay horses, a calash and\nfour, a chaise and four, enter the inn, in a yellow livery, turned up with\nred; four gentlemen on horseback, in blue, trimmed with silver: and as\nyellow is the colour given by the dukes in England, I went out to see what\nduke it was; but there was no coronet on the coach, only a plain\ncoat-of-arms on each, with this motto: ARGENTO LABORAT FABER. Upon\nenquiry, I found this great equipage belonged to a mountebank, and that\nhis name being Smith, the motto was a pun upon his name. The footmen in\nyellow were his tumblers and trumpeters, and those in blue his\nmerry-andrew, his apothecary, and his spokesman. He was dressed in black\nvelvet, and had in his coach a woman that danced on the ropes. He cures\nall diseases, and sells his packets for sixpence a-piece. He erected\nstages in all the market towns twenty miles round; and it is a prodigy how\nso wise a people as the English are gulled by such pickpockets. But his\namusements on the stage are worth the sixpence, without the pills. In the\nmorning he is dressed up in a fine brocade night-gown, for his chamber\npractice, when he gives advice, and gets large fees.\"\n\nA passage in a letter written by the second Lord Lyttelton, about the year\n1774, shows that this style of travelling was then still kept up by\nmountebanks. He says:--\"As a family party of us were crossing the road on\nthe side of Hagley Park, a chaise passed along, followed by a couple of\nattendants with French horns. Who can that be, said my father? Some\nitinerant mountebank, replied I, if one may judge from his musical\nfollowers. I really spoke with all the indifference of an innocent mind:\nnor did it occur to me that the Right Reverend Father in God, my uncle,\nhad sometimes been pleased to travel with servants similarly accoutred.\"\nNearly twenty years later, the famous quack, Katerfelto, travelled through\nDurham in a carriage, with a pair of horses, and attended by two negro\nservants in green liveries, with red collars. In the towns he visited\nthese men were sent round to announce his lectures on electricity and the\nmicroscope, blowing trumpets, and distributing hand-bills.\n\nThere seems to be good ground for believing that among what may be called\nthe amateur mountebanks, such as Rochester, we must count the author of\n\"Tristram Shandy.\" Dr. Dibdin found in the possession of Mr. James\nAtkinson, a medical practitioner at York, a rather roughly executed\npicture, in oil colours, representing a mountebank and his zany on a\nstage, surrounded by a crowd. An inscription described the former as Mr.\nT. Brydges, and the latter as the Rev. Laurence Sterne. Mr. Atkinson, who\nwas an octogenarian, told Dr. Dibdin that his father had been acquainted\nwith Sterne, who was a good amateur draughtsman, and that he and Brydges\neach painted the other's portrait in the picture. The story is a strange\none, but before it is dismissed as unworthy of belief, it must be\nremembered that the clerical story-writer was a droll and whimsical\ncharacter, and at no time much influenced by his priestly vocation. It is\nquite conceivable, therefore, that he may have indulged in such a freak on\nsome occasion during the period of his life in which he developed his\nworst moral deficiencies.\n\nIn the early years of the present century, a German quack, named Bossy,\nused to mount a stage on Tower Hill and Covent Garden Market alternately,\nin order, as he said, that both ends of London might profit by his\nexperience and skill. It is said that on one of these occasions, when he\nhad induced an old woman to mount his stage in the latter place, and\nrelate the wonderful cures the doctor had performed upon her, a parrot\nthat had learned some coarse language from the porters and costermongers\nfrequenting the market, and sometimes used it in a manner that seemed very\napt to the occasion, exclaimed, \"Lying old ----!\" when the old woman\nconcluded her narrative. The roar of laughter with which this criticism\nwas received by the rough audience disconcerted Bossy for a moment; but\nquickly recovering his presence of mind, he stepped forward, with his hand\non his heart, and gravely replied, \"It is no lie, you wicked bird!--it is\nall true as is de Gospel!\" Bossy attained considerable reputation, and\nended his days with a fair competence.\n\nThe mountebank has long fallen from his former high estate. The quack may\nstill be found vending his pills in the open-air markets of Yorkshire and\nLancashire; but he does not mount a stage, and resembles his predecessors\nof the last century only in the fluency and volubility of his discourse on\nthe virtues of his potions, pills, and plasters. The author of the paper\non mountebanks in the \"Book of Days\" (edited by Robert Chambers), states\nthat he saw one at York about 1860, who \"sold medicines on a stage in the\nold style, but without the Merry Andrew or the music,\" and adds that \"he\npresented himself in shabby black clothes, with a dirty white neck-cloth.\"\nEven the name had long before that time ceased to be connected with the\nvending of medicines, and had come to be applied to those itinerant circus\ncompanies who gave gratuitous performances in the open air, making their\ngains by the sale of lottery tickets. The present writer remembers seeing\nthe circus company of John Clarke performing on a piece of waste ground at\nLower Norwood, when the clown of the show went among the spectators\nselling tickets at a shilling each, entitling the holder to participate in\na drawing, the prizes in which were Britannia metal tea pots and milk\newers, papier mache tea trays, cotton gown pieces, etc. That must have\nbeen about 1835, or within a year or two of that time.\n\nOnly a few years later, a lottery in sixpenny shares was similarly\nconducted at Alfreton, in Derbyshire, and probably in many other places,\nthough contrary to the provisions of the Lottery Act.\n\nThe mountebank doctor of former times, with his carriage, his zany, and\nhis musicians, can now only be met with in the provincial towns of France\nand Italy, and even there but seldom. Thirty or forty years ago, there was\na man who, in a carriage drawn up behind the Louvre, used to practise\ndentistry and advertise his father, who had a flourishing dentist's\npractice in one of the narrow streets near the cathedral of Notre Dame.\nAnother of this fraternity was seen at Marseilles by an English tourist a\nfew years later, and in this instance some musicians accompanied the\nmountebank's phaeton, and drowned the cries of the suffering patients with\nthe crash of a march. But these survivals remind us rather of _Belphegor_,\nin the pathetic drama of that name, than of _Dulcamara_ in the opera of\n_L'Elisor d'Amore_, with his gorgeous equipage and his musical attendants,\nas old play-goers remember the personation of the character by the famous\nLablache.\n\n\n\n\nThe Strange Story of the Fight with the Small-Pox.\n\nBY THOMAS FROST.\n\n\nWhen, at the present day, we hear of an epidemic of small-pox in some town\nwhere the practice of vaccine inoculation has been neglected, it is both\ninstructive and consolatory to turn our thoughts back to the time, before\nthe introduction of that practice, when that horrible disease caused ten\nper cent, of all the deaths in excess of those occurring in the ordinary\ncourse of nature. This statement, startling as it may seem to the present\ngeneration, may be verified by reference to the annual bills of mortality\nof the city of London. This fearful state of things had prevailed in\nEngland from the time of the Plantagenets, when, in the first quarter of\nthe eighteenth century, a gleam of light was flashed upon the medical\ndarkness of western Europe from the east. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu,\nwriting from Adrianople to a lady friend in the spring of 1717, flashed\nthat light in the concluding portion of her letter, as follows:--\n\n    \"Apropos of distempers, I am going to tell you a thing that will make\n    you wish yourself here. The small-pox, so fatal and so general amongst\n    us, is here entirely harmless, by the invention of _ingrafting_, which\n    is the term they give it. There is a set of old women who make it\n    their business to perform the operation every autumn, in the month of\n    September, when the great heat is abated. People send to one another\n    to know if any of their family has a mind to have the small-pox; they\n    make parties for this purpose, and when they are met (commonly fifteen\n    or sixteen together), the old woman comes with a nut-shell full of the\n    matter of the best sort of small-pox, and asks what vein you please to\n    have opened. She immediately rips open that you offer to her with a\n    large needle (which gives you no more pain than a common scratch), and\n    puts into the vein as much matter as can lie upon the head of her\n    needle, and after that binds up the little wound with a hollow bit of\n    shell, and in this manner opens four or five veins.\n\n    ... Every year thousands undergo this operation; and the French\n    ambassador says pleasantly, that they take the small-pox here by way\n    of diversion, as they take the waters in other countries. There is no\n    example of any one that has died in it; and you may believe I am well\n    satisfied of the safety of this experiment, since I intend to try it\n    on my own little son.\"\n\nThis intention she carried into practice, and on her return to England\nmade great exertions to introduce inoculation into general use. The\nmedical profession opposed it so strongly, however, that for many years\nthe horrible distemper continued to rage unchecked. Such announcements as\nthe following were, in consequence, not unfrequent in the newspapers:--\n\n    \"WHEREAS the TOWN of BURY ST. EDMUND'S, where the GENERAL QUARTER\n    SESSIONS of the PEACE of that Division are usually held, is now\n    afflicted with the Small-Pox, for which reason it might be of\n    exceeding ill consequence to the Country in General to hold the\n    Sessions there; This is, therefore, to acquaint the PUBLIC that the\n    next GENERAL QUARTER SESSIONS of the Peace will be held at the sign of\n    the PICKEREL in IXWORTH, on Monday next.\n\n      \"COCKSEDGE, Clerk of the Peace.\"\n\nLater on in the same year (1744) an advertisement appeared, signed by the\nclergy, churchwardens, and medical practitioners of the town, stating that\n\"there were only twenty-one persons then lying ill of the small-pox.\"\nScarcely a week passed, in those days, without advertisements appearing of\nthe number of cases of the disease in certain towns. Careful study of a\nlarge number of these announcements shows, however, that it was only\nthought desirable to advertise when the epidemic was thought to be\nabating, or when it had abated. Take the following, for instance:--\n\n    \"Nov. 4, 1755.\n\n    \"Upon the strictest Inquiry made of the present state of the SMALL-POX\n    in BECCLES, it appears to be in eleven houses, and no more, and that\n    the truth may be constantly known, the same will be weekly advertised\n    alternately in the Ipswich and Norwich papers by us,\n\n      \"THO. PAGE, Rector.\n      \"OSM. CLARKE and IS. BLOWERS, Churchwardens.\"\n\nIn the following year we find it announced that, \"upon a strict inquiry\nmade by the clerks through their respective parishes, delivered to us, and\nattested by them, there is but six persons now afflicted with the\nsmall-pox in this town,\"--to wit, Colchester--and this statement is signed\nby three ministers and six medical practitioners. In the _Ipswich Journal_\nof Jan. 22nd, 1757, the following appeared:--\"There will be no fair this\nyear at Bildestone on Ash Wednesday, as usual, by reason of the small-pox\nbeing in several parishes not far off.\"\n\nThe practice of inoculation, though still frowned upon by a large\nproportion of the medical profession, was growing at this time, as appears\nfrom the following advertisement:--\n\n    \"COLCHESTER, May 12, 1762.\n\n    \"The Practice of bringing people out of the country into this town to\n    be inoculated for the Small-pox being very prejudicial to the town in\n    many respects, but especially to the Trade thereof, and as by this\n    practice the distemper may be continued much longer in the town than\n    it otherwise would, in all probability, it is thought proper by some\n    of the principal inhabitants and traders in the town, that this public\n    notice should be given that they are determined to prosecute any\n    person or persons whomsoever, that shall hereafter bring into this\n    town, or who shall receive into their houses in the town as lodgers,\n    any person or persons for that purpose, with the utmost severity that\n    the law will permit.... But that they might not be thought\n    discouragers of a practice so salutary and beneficial to mankind, as\n    inoculation is found to be, which encourages great numbers to go into\n    the practice, the persons who have caused this public notice to be\n    given have no objection to surgeons carrying on the practice in houses\n    properly situated for the purpose.\"\n\nThe \"great numbers\" of persons referred to in this notice as having \"gone\ninto the practice\" of inoculation for the small-pox appear to have been\nchiefly old women, as in Turkey, and by some of these it was carried on\nuntil the passing of the Vaccination Act in 1840. Five guineas was the fee\nadvertised in the _Ipswich Journal_ in 1761 for performing the operation\nby Robert Sutton, an operator in Kent, who announced that he had \"only met\nwith but one accident out of the many hundreds he has had under his cure.\"\n\nThe prevalence of this hideous disease in the last century, and the dread\nwhich it inspired, is curiously attested by the frequency with which\nadvertisements for servants, etc., appeared in the newspapers, in which\nthere was an express stipulation that applicants must have had the\nsmall-pox. A housemaid or footman whose face bore the traces of this\ndisease would not, at the present day, find their appearance much in their\nfavour: but the following selection of advertisements, culled from the\n_Ipswich Journal_ and the _Salisbury and Winchester Journal_, show that in\nthe last century the marks would increase their chances of obtaining\nemployment very considerably. The dates range from 1755 to 1781, and such\nannouncements might be increased to any extent.\n\n    \"A Three Years' APPRENTICE is wanted to use the Sea between\n    Manningtree and London, whose age is between 18 and 25 years, and has\n    had the Small-pox. Such a one, inquiring of MR. WM. LEACH, at Mistley\n    Thorne, in Essex, will hear of good encouragement.\"\n\n    \"WANTED, about Michaelmas, as Coachman, in a gentleman's family, who\n    can drive four horses, and ride postillion well. A Single Man, must\n    have had the Small-pox, and know how to drive in London. Such an one,\n    who can be well recommended, by giving a description of himself, his\n    age, and abilities, in a letter directed to A. B., at MR. J.\n    KENDALL'S, in COLCHESTER, may hear of a very good place.\"\n\n    \"WANTED, a JOURNEYMAN BAKER, that is a good workman, and has had the\n    SMALL-POX. Such a person may hear of a good place by applying to MR.\n    JOHN STOW, at Sudbury, or to the Printer of this paper.\"\n\n    \"Wanted an Apprentice to an eminent Surgeon in full practice in the\n    county of Suffolk. If he has not had the Small-Pox, it is expected he\n    will be inoculated for it, before he enters on business.--Enquire of\n    JOHN FOX, at Dedham, Essex.\"\n\n\n    \"COLCHESTER, June 15th, 1762.\n\n    \"Wanted immediately, a Stout Lad as an Apprentice to a Currier. If he\n    can write it will be the more agreeable. Inquire further of ELEANOR\n    ONYON. N.B.--If he has not had the Small-pox, he need not apply.\"\n\n    \"WANTED for a gentleman that lives most part of the year in London, A\n    Genteel Person, between 28 and 40 years of age, that has had the\n    Small-pox, to be as Companion and Housekeeper. One that has been\n    brought up in a genteel, frugal and handsome manner, either a Maid or\n    Widow, so they have no incumbrances.\"\n\n    \"WANTED, a NURSEMAID. None need apply who cannot bring a good\n    character from their last place; and has had the Small-pox.\"\n\n    \"WANTS a place in a large or small family, in town or country, a YOUNG\n    MAN, who is well versed in the different branches of a Gardener, has\n    had the Small-pox, and can write a good hand.\"\n\n    \"WANTED, in a large family, a STOUT WOMAN, about 30, single, or a\n    widow without children, who has had the Small-pox, to take care of a\n    lusty child, under a year old. Her character must be unexceptionable,\n    and by no means a fashionable dresser, and lived in families of\n    credit. Any person answering this description may enquire of MRS.\n    MERCER, at the Star and Garter, Andover, and be further informed.\"\n\nIt was about the time when the last of these advertisements appeared that\nJenner commenced his inquiries concerning the prophylactic virtues of\ncow-pox, though nearly twenty years elapsed before they were sufficiently\nadvanced to enable him to make the results known. His idea of using\nvaccine inoculation to bring about the total extinction of small pox was\nscouted by those of his professional brethren to whom he mentioned it, and\nwe learn from one of his biographers that, at the outset, \"both his own\nobservation and that of other medical men of his acquaintance proved to\nhim that what was commonly called cow-pox was not a certain preventive of\nsmall-pox. But he ascertained by assiduous inquiry and personal\ninvestigation that cows were liable to various kinds of eruption on their\nteats, all capable of being communicated to the hands of the milkers; and\nthat such sores when so communicated were all called cow-pox.\" But when he\nhad traced out the nature of these various diseases, and ascertained which\nof them possessed the protective virtue against small-pox, he was again\nfoiled by learning that in some cases when what he now called the true\ncow-pox broke out among the cattle on a dairy farm, and had been\ncommunicated to the milkers, they subsequently had small-pox. These\nrepeated failures perplexed him, but at the same time stimulated, instead\nof discouraging him. He conceived the idea that the virus of cow-pox\nmight undergo some change which deprived it of its protective power, while\nstill enabling it to communicate a disease to human beings. Following up\nthe inquiry from this point, he at length discovered that the virus was\ncapable of imparting protection against small-pox only in a certain\ncondition of the pustule.\n\nHe was now prepared to submit his theory to the test of experiment, but it\nwas not until 1796 that he had the opportunity. A dairymaid, who had\ncontracted cow-pox from one of her employer's cows, afforded the matter,\nand Jenner introduced it into two incisions in the arms of a boy about\neight years of age. The disease thus transferred ran its ordinary course\nwithout any ill effects, and the boy was afterwards inoculated with the\nvirus of small pox, which produced no effect. The disappearance of the\ncow-pox from the dairies in the neighbourhood of his country practice in\nGloucestershire prevented him from making further experiments; and when he\nvisited London for that purpose, he had the mortification of finding that\nno one could be found who would consent to be operated upon. It was not\nuntil 1798 that this obstacle was overcome, and then, the results of the\nearlier experiments having been confirmed by a series of vaccinations,\nfollowed by inoculation for small-pox several months afterwards without\neffect, Jenner made his discovery public.\n\nIn the following year, vaccine inoculation began to spread, the practice\nbeing taken up by many of Jenner's friends, including several who were not\nin the medical profession. But, like inoculation for the small-pox, when\nintroduced by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu,--like all innovations on\nestablished practices, indeed,--vaccination received for many years after\nits introduction the most violent opposition. Just as inoculation for\nsmall-pox had been denounced from the pulpit and in medical treatises as a\n\"diabolical operation\" and a wicked interference with the designs of\nProvidence, so did a certain Dr. Squirrel denounce vaccination as an\nattempt to change \"the established laws of nature.\" The most absurd\nstories were circulated of the effects alleged to have followed\nvaccination. \"A lady,\" it is stated by Mr. Bettany, \"complained that since\nher daughter had been vaccinated she coughed like a cow, and had grown\nhairy all over her body; and in one country district it was stated that\nvaccination had been discontinued there, because those who had been\ninoculated in that manner bellowed like bulls.\" There were even doctors\nwho pretended to detect resemblances to bovine visages in the countenances\nof children, produced, as they did not hesitate to declare, by\nvaccination! Self-interest may have had as much to do as prejudice in\nprompting the opposition of the profession. Many practitioners derived a\nconsiderable portion of their income from fees for inoculation for\nsmall-pox. Sutton, as we have seen, charged five guineas for the\noperation, and advertised himself in many provincial newspapers; and the\nincome of Dr. Woodville, at one time physician to the Small-Pox Hospital,\nis said to have sunk in one year from a thousand pounds to a hundred on\nhis adopting the practice of vaccination.\n\nNotwithstanding the prejudice and interested antagonism to which the new\npractice was exposed, it continued to make way. The Rev. Dr. Booker, of\nDudley, gave the following striking testimony to its beneficial\neffects:--\"I have, previous to the knowledge of vaccine inoculation,\nfrequently buried, day after day, several (and once as many as eight)\nvictims of the small-pox. But since the parish has been blessed with this\ninvaluable boon of Divine Providence (cow pox), introduced among us nearly\nfour years ago, only two victims have fallen a prey to the above ravaging\ndisorder (small pox). In the surrounding villages, like an insatiable\nMoloch, it has lately been devouring vast numbers, where obstinacy and\nprejudice have precluded the Jennerian protective blessing.\"\n\nIn 1803, the Royal Jennerian Institution was founded under royal\npatronage, and with Jenner as president, to promote vaccination in London\nand elsewhere; and its operations were continued for a few years with much\nsuccess, ceasing, however, on the establishment of the National Vaccine\nInstitution in 1808. Two years prior to this event, Lord Henry Petty, who\nthen held the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer, carried a motion in\nthe House of Commons, that the Royal College of Physicians should be\nrequested to inquire and report on the progress of vaccination. The\nreport, which appeared in the following year, set forth that, within eight\nyears from the discovery of vaccination, some hundreds of thousands of\npersons had been vaccinated in the British Islands, and upwards of eight\nhundred thousand in our East Indian possessions, and that the practice\nhad been generally adopted on the continent of Europe. Considering that\nsmall-pox destroyed one-sixth of those whom it attacked, and that nearly\none-tenth, and in some years more than that proportion, of the entire\nmortality in London was caused by it, and also the number, respectability,\nand extensive experience of the advocates of vaccination, compared with\nthe feeble and imperfect testimonies of its few opponents, the value of\nthe practice seemed firmly established.\n\nThis report did much to advance vaccination in public opinion. At the next\nquarter sessions held at Stafford, it was taken into consideration by the\ncounty magistrates, who, from its statements and the reports and\ntestimonials sent to Jenner, considered themselves justified in placing it\non record--\"That vaccine inoculation, properly conducted, appeared never\nto have failed as a certain preservative against small-pox; that it was\nunattended by fever, and perfectly free from danger; that it required\nneither confinement, loss of time, nor previous preparation; that it was\nnot infectious, nor productive of other diseases; that it might be\nperformed with safety on persons of every age and sex, and at all times\nand seasons of the year.\" It was not, however, until 1840 that the results\nof the labours of Jenner, the report of the Royal College of Physicians,\nand the opinions of nearly the entire medical profession received\nlegislative endorsement by the passing of the Vaccination Act, since which\nsmall-pox has become a thing of the past, except in cases where it has\nbeen conserved by prejudice and ignorance.\n\n\n\n\nBurkers and Body-Snatchers.\n\nBY THOMAS FROST.\n\n\nHow recollections will crowd upon the mind when a train of thought is set\nin motion by the association of ideas! When, many years ago, I visited Dr.\nKahn's anatomical museum, then located in Tichborne Street, I there saw a\nhuman skeleton which was affirmed by the lecturer, Dr. Sexton, to be that\nof John Bishop, who was hanged in 1831, for the murder of an Italian boy\nnamed Carlo Ferrari, at a house in Nova Scotia Gardens, one of the slums\nthen existing in the north-eastern quarter of London. Though nearly forty\nyears had elapsed since the commission of the crime, and I was only ten\nyears of age when I heard the horrible story which the sight of that\nghastly relic of mortality recalled to my mind, all the incidents\nconnected with it immediately passed before my mental vision like a\nhideous phantasmagoria. The vividness with which they came back to me may\nbe accounted for by the deep impression which they made upon my mind at\nthe time of their occurrence. Those whose memories will carry them back\nsixty years will readily understand this.\n\nAt the time when the public mind was harrowed by the narration in the\nnewspapers of the horrible circumstances connected with the murder, and\nfor some time previously, a fearful excitement had been created in all\nparts of the country by stories of murders committed and graves robbed of\ntheir ghastly tenants for the purpose of supplying with \"subjects\" the\ndissecting tables of the London and Edinburgh schools of anatomy. In the\nlatter city two miscreants named Burke and Hare had been convicted of\nmurder for this purpose, and one of them hanged for their crimes; but the\nscare had not abated. Stories were told with appalling frequency of\ncorpses missing from lonely graveyards and of narrow escapes from murder\nin little frequented places. Chloroform had not then been discovered, but\nthe Scotch professors of the art of murder had introduced the practice,\npopularly named after one of them, of disabling their victims by means of\na pitch plaster suddenly clapped on the mouth. Every person who was\nmissing was thought to have been \"burked,\" and the watching of graves to\nprevent the removal of newly-buried corpses became an established\npractice. As the dark nights of the late autumn came on, the fears of the\ntimid and nervous were doubled, and persons who lived in lonely places, or\nin the ill-lighted parts of towns, became afraid to leave their houses\nafter nightfall. I remember hearing such fears expressed by several\npersons at Croydon, with whom my parents were acquainted, and also of\nneighbours combining to assist in watching the graves of deceased members\nof each others' families.\n\nA few years ago, I was one day exchanging reminiscences of a long bygone\ngeneration with a brother journalist, when, on this gruesome subject being\nmentioned, he placed in my hands a report of the trial of the murderers of\nCarlo Ferrari, which appeared to have been detached from a volume of\ncriminal trials. No feature of the horrible record impressed me so much as\nthe cool, business-like manner in which the wretches concerned in the\ncrime hawked the corpse of their victim from one school of anatomy to\nanother, and the equally cool and business-like manner in which the matter\nwas dealt with by those with whom their nefarious occupation brought them\nin contact. The procuring of corpses for anatomical purposes was, in fact,\na regular trade, and the biographer of Sir Astley Cooper states that \"the\nResurrection-men were occasionally employed on expeditions into the\ncountry to obtain possession of the bodies of those who had been subjected\nto some important operation, and of which a _post mortem_ examination was\nof the greatest interest to science. Scarcely any distance from London was\nconsidered an insuperable difficulty in the attaining of this object, and\nas certainly as the Resurrectionist undertook the task, so certain was he\nof completing it. This was usually an expensive undertaking, but still it\ndid not restrain the most zealous in their profession from occasionally\nengaging these men in this employment.\" The price of a subject ranged from\nseven to twelve guineas, but when the \"body-snatchers\" were specially\nemployed to procure some particular corpse, the incidental expenses were\noften as much more.\n\nAs an illustration of the times in which such horrors were possible, the\nstory of the murder of Carlo Ferrari may, at this distance of time from\nthe event, be worth telling. In the autumn of 1831, there lived in one of\na row of small houses, known as Nova Scotia Gardens, in the\npoverty-stricken district of Bethnal Green, a man named John Bishop, with\nhis wife and three children. He had formerly been a carrier at Highgate,\nbut had long been suspected of \"body-snatching,\" as the practice of\nrobbing graves was termed, and had no visible means of honest living. He\nhad the look of a man whose original rustic stolidity had been\nsupercharged with cockney cunning. The house adjoining Bishop's was\noccupied by a man named Woodcock, who had succeeded in the tenancy a\nglass-blower named Thomas Williams, described as a little, simple-looking\nman, of mild and inoffensive demeanour. About two o'clock on the morning\nof the 4th of November, Woodcock was awakened by a noise, as of a scuffle,\nin Bishop's house, and afterwards heard two men leave it and return in a\nfew minutes, when he recognised the voices as those of Bishop and\nWilliams. At noon the same day these two men were in a neighbouring\npublic-house, accompanied by two other men, one of whom was known as James\nMay, who had formerly been a butcher, but for the last few years had been\nsuspected of following the same ghastly and revolting occupation as\nBishop. In the afternoon three men alighted from a cab at Nova Scotia\nGardens, two of them being recognised as Bishop and Williams, and\nafterwards returned to the vehicle, when the former and the third man were\ncarrying something in a sack, which they placed in the cab. The three men\nthen entered, and it was driven off.\n\nAbout seven o'clock the same evening, Bishop and May presented themselves\nat Guy's Hospital, carrying something in a sack, and asked the porter if a\n\"subject\" was wanted. Receiving a negative reply, they asked him to allow\n\"it\" to remain there until the next morning, to which he consented.\nHalf-an-hour later, the two traffickers in human flesh called at\nGrainger's anatomical theatre, in Webb Street, Southwark, and told the\ncurator they had \"a very fresh male subject, about fourteen years of age.\"\nThe offer being declined, they went away, and later on they were,\naccompanied by Williams, in a public-house, where May was seen by a waiter\nto pour water on a handkerchief containing human teeth, and then rub the\nteeth together, remarking that they were worth two pounds to him.\n\nNext morning, May called upon a dentist named Mills, on Newington\nCauseway, and sold a dozen teeth to him for a guinea, observing that they\nwere the teeth of a boy fourteen years of age. On examining them, Mills\nfound that morsels of the gums and splinters of the jaw were adhering to\nthem, as if much force had been used to wrench them out. Two hours later,\nBishop and May called again at the anatomical theatre in Southwark, and\nrepeated their offer of the preceding evening, which was again declined.\nShortly afterwards, they went to Guy's Hospital, accompanied by Williams\nand a man named Shields, to remove the \"subject\" left there the evening\nbefore, and it was given to them in the sack, as they had left it, and\nplaced in a large hamper, which Shields had brought for the purpose. There\nwas a hole in the sack, through which the porter saw a small foot\nprotruding, apparently that of a boy or a woman.\n\nAbout midnight, the bell of King's College was rung, and the porter, on\ngoing to the gate, found there Bishop and May, whom he had seen there\nbefore, it seems, and on similar business. May asked him if anything was\nwanted, and receiving an indifferent answer, added that they had a male\n\"subject,\" a boy about fourteen years of age. The porter inquired the\nprice, and was told they wanted twelve guineas for it. He then said he\nwould ask Mr. Partridge, the demonstrator in anatomy, and they followed\nhim to a room adjoining the dissecting room. Nine guineas were offered,\nwhich May, with an oath, refused, and went outside. Bishop then said to\nthe porter, \"Never mind May, he is drunk; it shall come in for nine in\nhalf-an-hour.\" They then went away, returning at the stipulated time,\naccompanied by Williams and Shields, the latter carrying on his head the\nhamper containing the corpse brought from Guy's Hospital. It was taken\ninto a room, where it was opened, and the corpse turned out of the sack by\nMay. The porter, observing a cut on the left temple, and that the left arm\nwas bent and the fingers clenched, conceived suspicions of foul play, and\ncommunicated them at once to Mr. Partridge. That gentleman thereupon\nexamined the corpse, and mentioned its condition to the secretary, who\nimmediately gave information to the police.\n\nIn order to detain the men until the arrival of the police, the\ndemonstrator showed them a L50 note, observing that he must get it changed\nfor gold before he could pay them. Several constables were soon on the\nspot, and the four men were arrested, and taken to the station-house in\nVine Street, Covent Garden. On being charged on suspicion with having\nunlawful possession of a corpse, May said he had nothing to do with it,\nand had merely accompanied Bishop. A similar statement was made by\nWilliams, and Bishop said he was only removing the corpse from St.\nThomas's Hospital to King's College. Shields, who was known as a porter,\nsaid he was employed to carry the hamper, which he did in the exercise of\nhis vocation. They were all then removed to the cells.\n\nThe evidence given at the coroner's inquest by Partridge and two other\nsurgeons left no doubt that the unfortunate lad, respecting whose identity\nthere was no evidence, had been killed by a violent blow on the back of\nthe neck, which had affected the spinal cord. The four accused men were\npresent in custody during the inquiry, and Bishop, after reading a bill\nrelating to the murder, which was displayed on the wall of the room, was\nheard by a constable to say, in a subdued tone, to May, \"It was the blood\nthat sold us.\" Volunteering to give evidence, he said he got the corpse\nfrom a grave, but declined to name the place whence he had got it,\nalleging that the information would get into trouble two watchmen, who\nhad large families. May also made a voluntary statement, to the effect\nthat he got two \"subjects\" from the country, which he took first to\nGrainger's theatre of anatomy, and afterwards to Guy's Hospital,\nsubsequently meeting Bishop, who promised him all he could get for a\n\"subject\" above nine guineas if he would sell it for him. The inquest was\nadjourned, and the police proceeded with their investigation.\n\nThe houses of Bishop and May had been promptly visited and searched by the\npolice, who found at the former's a sack, a large hamper, and a brad-awl,\nthe last showing recent bloodstains. At May's house in Dorset Street, New\nKent Road, they found a pair of breeches, stained with blood at the back.\nOn a second visit to Bishop's house the garden was dug over, and a jacket,\ntrousers, and a shirt found in one spot, and in another a coat, trousers,\na vest with blood on the collar and one shoulder, and a shirt with the\nfront torn. When the brad-awl was produced at Bow Street police-court, May\nsaid, \"That is the instrument I punched the teeth out with.\" Shields was\neventually discharged from custody, but the other three prisoners were\ncommitted for trial on the capital charge.\n\nThe identity of the victim remained a mystery until the 19th of November,\na fortnight after the murder, when the corpse was recognised by a\nforeigner named Brun as that of a boy named Carlo Ferrari, whom he had\nbrought from Italy two years before, but had not seen since July, 1830.\nThe boy picked up the means of living by exhibiting a tortoise and a pair\nof white mice in the streets. He had been seen by several persons in or\nnear Nova Scotia Gardens on the 3rd of November, but he had not been seen\nsince, nor had he returned on that day to his miserable lodgings in\nCharles Street, Drury Lane. The clothes found in Bishop's garden\ncorresponded with the description given of those worn by him when he was\nlast seen, and a little boy who played with Bishop's children stated that\nthey had, on the following day, shown him two white mice in a cage similar\nto the one carried by Ferrari.\n\nThe incidents of the crime, as revealed from day to day, and the mystery\nin which the identity of the victim was for some time veiled, created so\nmuch excitement in the public mind, that when the prisoners were placed\nin the dock at the Old Bailey, early in December, the court was crowded,\nand a guinea each was paid for seats in the gallery, the occupants of\nwhich, all fashionably dressed, as might be expected of those who could\nafford to pay that price for the gratification of their love of the\nsensational, had taken their seats the day before. Though the evidence was\nbut a recapitulation of the story told before in the police-court and the\ninquest-room, it was listened to with the utmost avidity. The witnesses\nfor the defence were few, and their evidence valueless, except in the case\nof May, for whom an _alibi_ was established in respect of the time between\nthe afternoon of the day preceding the murder and noon on the following\nday. The prisoners were sentenced to death, but in May's case the sentence\nwas commuted into transportation for life. A sea-faring relative of mine,\nwho was second officer of the vessel in which May was sent out to Sydney,\ndescribed him as an athletic, wiry-looking man, with features expressive\nof sternness, and a determined will, quite a different-looking man,\ntherefore, to his two companions in crime, who were duly hanged at\nNewgate.\n\nThe crime of these men, and the deeds of Burke and Hare, created such a\nscare, and exposed so vividly the temptation to murder afforded by the\nprices paid by surgeons for \"subjects,\" that the attention of parliament\nwas directed to the matter, and a Select Committee of the House of Commons\nwas appointed to inquire and report as to the facilities which might be\ngiven for obtaining bodies for anatomical purposes in a legitimate manner.\n\nSir Astley Cooper, who was one of the eminent surgeons who gave evidence\nbefore this committee, was asked whether the state of the law prevented\nteachers of anatomy from obtaining the body of any person, which, in\nconsequence of some peculiarity of structure, they might be desirous of\nprocuring. He replied:--\"The law does not prevent our obtaining the body\nof an individual if we think proper; for there is no person, let his\nsituation in life be what it may, whom, if I were disposed to dissect, I\ncould not obtain.... The law only enhances the price, and does not prevent\nthe exhumation. Nobody is secured by the law; it only adds to the price of\nthe subject.\" The result of this inquiry was the passing of the Anatomy\nAct, by which the bodies of persons dying in hospitals and workhouses, if\nunclaimed by the relatives, may be placed at the disposal of the schools\nof anatomy.\n\n\n\n\nReminiscences of the Cholera.\n\nBY THOMAS FROST.\n\n\nIt is now more than sixty years since the strange and mysterious\nvisitation, as it was then considered, known as the cholera morbus, for\nwhich fearsome name that of Asiatic cholera has since been substituted,\nmade its first appearance in this country, or anywhere west of the Ural\nMountains. Coming first from India, from the banks of the Ganges and the\nIndus, the dread pestilence moved steadily westward and north-westward\nuntil, creeping along the rivers of Russia, and desolating all the most\nconsiderable towns of that country, it reached St. Petersburg. There it\nraged with fearful severity, mowing down as with the scythe of Death more\nthan a thousand persons daily. So dreadful were the features of the\nunknown malady, and so rapidly were its victims carried off, that the\nignorant populace of the capital attributed it to poison administered by\nthe doctors. A fearful tumult was excited by this belief, and it was with\ngreat difficulty that it was suppressed.\n\nFrom Russia the dire disease spread rapidly into almost every country in\nEurope, and wherever it appeared created the profoundest awe and the most\nbewildering terror. In Paris it broke out with extreme malignity in March,\n1832, and soon raged there with greater virulence than it had exhibited in\nany other city in Europe except St. Petersburg. The deaths soon reached\nfrom four to five hundred daily, and during April they rose to a total for\nthe month of twelve thousand seven hundred. It was hinted that the ravages\nof this new and dreadful disease were caused by the poisoning of the meat\nsold in the markets and the water in the public fountains; and the\ndwellers in the slums became so infuriated by this horrible and absurd\nrumour that mobs perambulated the streets howling for vengeance on the\npoisoners. Many unfortunate persons were murdered in the streets on being\ndenounced as the perpetrators of these imaginary crimes, and so paralysed\nwas the arm of justice by the influence of terror that nothing was done to\nvindicate the majesty of the law. Everyone who could afford to leave Paris\nfled from it with precipitation, and the city was abandoned to desolation\nand anarchy. The legislative labours of the two Chambers were suspended,\nand the peers and deputies were the first to set the example of flight,\nthough Louis Philippe and his family continued to reside at the Tuileries,\nwith an occasional sojourn of a few days at Neuilly.\n\nI have a vivid recollection of the mingled awe and terror which this fell\ndisease inspired when it was announced that it had crossed the sea and\nmade its first victims in this country. It had made its way across the\ncontinent from town to town on the banks of the great rivers, but into\nEngland it was imported by sick sailors. Many generations had passed away\nsince anything like a pestilence had been known in England, and the\ncholera therefore created a panic among all classes of the people, which\nserved to augment its virulence and render those of a nervous temperament\nmore liable to be attacked by it. Doctors were utterly unacquainted with\nits proper treatment, and indeed had no knowledge whatever of the disease.\nHence it raged without check wherever it appeared, and the rapidity with\nwhich it carried off its victims added to the terror inspired by its\napproaches. The first death at Lower Norwood, where my parents then\nresided, was that of the pastor of the Independent Chapel, situated only\ntwo doors from my father's house. He died in a few hours from the time he\nexperienced the premonitory symptoms, and such was the dread of infection\nthat the corpse was buried the same night by torchlight, in the\nburial-ground of the chapel, wrapped in a sheet coated with pitch.\n\nThough a period of seventeen years separated the first cholera epidemic\nfrom the second, the lessons which the former should have taught had not\nbeen so well learned as they should have been, and the latter, with which\nthese reminiscences are chiefly concerned, inspired a wild, unreasoning\nterror in only a little less degree than that of 1832.\n\nI remember a case at Mitcham, in which the women attending a patient were\nseized with a panic on the approach of death, and rushed out of the house,\nleaving the poor wretch, a woman, to die alone, the corpse being\nafterwards found rigid and distorted.\n\nThe apparently erratic manner in which the disease spread, sometimes\ncarrying off victims from one side of a street and sparing the other side,\nsometimes smiting every member of a family in one house, and passing over\nall the other houses in the same street, was a puzzle to persons who had\ngiven no attention to the causes of the disease, and were content to\nregard it as a sign of the wrath of God, reasoning about the matter as\nlittle as did the Israelites whose relatives were swept off at\nKibroth-hattaavah. They had not given sufficient attention to the laws of\nhealth to understand that the disease found its victims where those laws\nwere neglected, whether from carelessness or from ignorance.\n\nI remember two cases at Croydon in which all the inmates of the houses in\nwhich the disease manifested its dread presence were carried off by it.\nOne occurred in a cottage in St. James's Road, one of a row which had\noriginally been level with the road, but had become overshadowed by the\napproach to the railway bridge. There were three victims in that house,\nand no other case in the same row, or in the neighbourhood. The other case\noccurred in King Street, one of several narrow, closely-built streets in\nthe centre of the town, and the victims were a widow and her only child,\nthe latter dying not alone, for, like Byron's Haidee,--\n\n                          \"----she held within\n      A second principle of life, which might\n    Have dawned a fair and sinless child of sin;\n      But closed its little being without light,\n    And went down to the grave unborn, wherein\n      Blossom and bough lie withered with one blight.\"\n\nA remarkable incident occurred while the fell disease was in the full\nswing of its ravages. The wife of a working man living in the Old Town, a\nlow-lying and densely populated quarter, was attacked by it, and at once\nremoved to a temporary hospital that had been established on Duppas Hill,\na tabular eminence overlooking the town, and in the thirteenth century the\nscene of the tournament in which the son of Earl Warrenne was by\nmisadventure slain. There her husband went, on his return from labour, to\nascertain her condition, and heard with a shock which the reader may\nimagine that she was dead. When the poor fellow had in some degree\nrecovered from the blow, he expressed a wish to see the corpse and take it\nto his home. He seems to have been unable to realise that his wife was\nreally dead, though the nurses and doctors assured him that she had passed\naway. The idea that life yet lingered in the form that was apparently\nlifeless grew upon him as he gazed and though he may never have read \"The\nGiaour,\" he may have felt the force of the thought so finely expressed by\nByron in the lines that introduce his picture of the Greece of his day:--\n\n          \"He who hath bent him o'er the dead,\n    Ere the first day of death is fled,\n    The first dark day of nothingness,\n    The last of danger and distress\n    (Before Decay's effacing fingers\n    Have swept the lines where beauty lingers),\n    And marked the mild angelic air,\n    The rapture of repose that's there,\n    The fixed yet tender traits that streak\n    The languor of the pallid cheek,\n    And--but for that sad shrouded eye,\n        That fires not, wins not, weeps not, now,\n        And but for that chill, changeless brow,\n    Where cold Obstruction's apathy\n    Appals the gazing mourner's heart,\n    As if to him it could impart\n    The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon;\n    Yes, but for these, and these alone,\n    Some moments, aye, one treacherous hour,\n    He still might doubt the tyrant's power;\n    So fair, so calm, so softly sealed,\n    The first, last look by death revealed!\"\n\nWhether it was feeling or reason that inspired the thought that life yet\nlingered in the apparently inanimate, but not yet rigid form, which the\nloving husband conveyed to his humble dwelling, it was undoubtedly to that\ninspiration that the woman owed her preservation from death. For she was\nnot dead. Signs of returning animation were perceived when the supposed\ncorpse was placed upon the bed, and the neighbour women who came in to\nperform the last sad offices for the dead were there to welcome her on her\nreturn to life. I will not attempt to describe the feelings with which the\nhusband beheld the eyelids of his wife unclose, and the rose-tints return\nto the pallid cheeks. Like the Greek painter who, conscious of the\ninadequacy of his art to fully portray the grief of Agamemnon for the loss\nof his son, covered the countenance of the old king with a veil, I draw\nthe curtain upon the scene, and leave it to the imagination of the reader.\n\nAmong the remedies for the cholera which came into vogue during the\nprevalence of the epidemic of 1849, the rubbing of the stomach with brandy\nand salt obtained a considerable degree of repute; and the chemists vied\nwith each other, as in the recent epidemics of influenza, in the\nconcoction and advertising of various cholera mixtures, one of the most\nefficacious of which was a preparation of opium and chalk.\n\nThe lessons of the cholera were not so entirely neglected on this occasion\nas they were after the epidemic of 1832; but it is a sad reflection on our\nlegislation that we were indebted to the ravages of disease, or rather to\nthe fear inspired by them, for sanitary reforms which ought to have\nresulted from foresight. There had been sanitary inquiries by Royal\nCommissions between 1842 and 1849, but little had been done towards\ncarrying out the recommendations which resulted from them. The existence\nof cholera in India, and the causes which produced it, had long been\nknown; but so long as its ravages were confined to the people of that\ncountry no one seemed to think that it concerned the people of England. It\nwas known, too, that whatever might be the true causes of zymotic\ndiseases, concerning which medical opinions differed, accumulations of\nfilth, contaminated sources of water supply, and an impure condition of\nthe atmosphere tended to produce their outbreaks, and to aggravate their\nvirulence. But then we had been used to these evils since the days of the\nPlantagenets, and though they had become intensified with the increase of\npopulation and the growth of the large towns, had not Malthus taught us\nthat epidemics of disease were one of the means used by divine providence\nto prevent the numbers of the human race from exceeding the means of\nsubsistence?\n\nThe cholera epidemic of 1849 roused the public mind from its lethargy, and\nprepared it to act upon the recommendations of the General Board of Health\nand to comply with the Sanitary Act of that year. The old wells of London\nwere closed, and the like course was adopted in Croydon, where a constant\nsupply of practically pure water was obtained by boring down to the chalk.\nOther towns followed the example, one of the foremost being Birmingham,\nwhich received a supply which enabled the inhabitants to dispense with the\ninsalubrious rain-water butt. Sewerage works were undertaken where no\nefficient system of drainage had before existed. Attention was called to\nthe important questions of sewage disposal and the pollution of rivers;\nand though much even now remains to be done in this direction, and in the\nimprovement of the water supply of the large manufacturing towns of\nYorkshire and Lancashire, sanitation has been cleared of most of its\ndifficulties by better knowledge of the philosophy of cause and effect, so\nthat we no longer regard the calamities resulting from our own ignorance\nand neglect of the laws of nature as the inflictions of Providence.\n\n\n\n\nSome Old Doctors.\n\nBY MRS. G. LINNAEUS BANKS.\n\n\nIt is not my intention to go back to those Greek fathers of the healing\nart, Hippocrates and Galen, or to dwell on the days when every monastery\nheld within its walls some learned brother accredited to administer to\nbodies as well as souls diseased, or when the mistress of every feudal\ncastle, every baronial-hall, was trained and skilled in leechcraft,\ndistilled herbs, concocted potions and unguents, and not only physicked\nher household, but was prepared to staunch and dress the gaping wounds\nreceived in siege or tournay. Nor yet have we ought to do with those\npretenders to science who mingled astrology with pharmacy, ascribed to\nevery plant its ruling planet, and held that the potency of all herbs\ndepended on the conjunction of planets, or the phase of the moon under\nwhich they were gathered--a belief, indeed, under which old Nicholas\nCulpepper compiled his well-known \"Herbal\" early in the seventeenth\ncentury.\n\nMedicine and surgery have made rapid strides since the days, not a century\nagone, when in the naval cockpit, and on the open battlefield, the hatchet\nwas the ready implement for amputation, the rough cautery that of a red\nhot iron applied to the fizzing flesh; and when the doctor cried, \"Spit,\nman, spit\" to the suffering soldier with a gunshot wound in his chest, and\nwhen the sputum came tinged with blood, simply plugged up the bullet-hole\nand left the poor fellow to his fate, while he passed on to cases less\nhopeless. And _en passant_ I may say that wooden legs and stumps for arms\nwere so common in the writer's young days as scarcely to attract\nattention--so ready were army surgeons to amputate.\n\nThese are not matters on which I have to dwell, but I think the present\nwork would be incomplete without a record of those men of original mind,\nwhose acute observation and unwearied investigations in the past have\nindissolubly linked their names with discoveries which have revolutionised\nthe practice of both medicine and surgery.\n\nIn the opinion of Solomon, \"there is nothing new under the sun;\" and if\nsuch was the case in his day, how much more of a verity must be the\ntruism in ours.\n\nSo the most startling and perfect revelation of any great fact in human\nphysiology may have been dimly perceptible to earlier intelligences\ngroping in the dark, faint adumbrations of which may fall on the sensorium\nof the final discoverer, until a ray of divine light dispels the mists of\nages, and the man, developing his crude idea with infinite pains, realises\na great truth, and cries out \"Eureka\" to an astonished--and too often--an\nunbelieving world.\n\nThus it may have been with the renowned practitioner, WILLIAM HARVEY, who\ncame into the world when all England was filled with alarms of an\n\"Invincible Spanish Armada,\" then preparing to devastate our shores and\nspare neither man nor maid, babe nor mother. Yet the scare passed and\npeace came, and the boy grew, until his educational course at Cambridge\nended, and his bias led him towards Padua, then the great seat of\nacademical and medical lore, and there he took his doctor's degree in\nphysic. With the prestige of Padua upon him, in 1607, when he was but\ntwenty years of age, he was elected Fellow of the College of Physicians\n(founded by Dr. Linacre in the reign of Henry VII.), and in 1715, the man\nof twenty-eight became their Anatomical Reader.\n\nA noteworthy appointment this, since consequent study and investigation\nled to the grand discovery that the heart--to speak unscientifically--was\na sort of muscular pumping-engine, sending the blood circulating along a\nseries of blood-vessels to every part of the system, changing in character\non its course until it returned to its centre, the seat of life, to be\npumped out afresh to circulate as before and do its appointed work.\n\nIn 1628, Harvey made his discovery known in a learned treatise \"On the\ncirculation of the blood,\" and as may be supposed, his daring assertions\nroused a violent spirit of opposition amongst his medical brethren, even\namong those who began to feel the pulses of their patients for the first\ntime, and to comprehend _why_ there should be a fluttering or audible\nbeating under the sick one's ribs, and wherefore the fatal hemorrhage\nfollowing a sword-thrust or a gunshot wound.\n\nIn spite of opposition his teaching created a revolution in medical\npractice. The discoverer was called before Charles I. and his Court to\ndemonstrate the action of the heart and subsidiary organs, in support of\nhis new doctrine.\n\nFresh honours fell upon him even when too old to bear the burden. And when\nin the fulness of time, William Harvey, who had outlived three monarchs,\nmade his own exit under Cromwellian rule, he bequeathed infinitely more to\nposterity in his invaluable discovery than can be summed up in the estate,\nlibrary, and museum now in the proud possession of the College of\nPhysicians. These are held by a mere body of men. The other has a\nworld-wide significance.\n\nYet, as in his life, even in his grave, detractors strove to dim the glory\nof his important revelation, ascribing to the theological physician\nServetus, to Realdus Columbus, and to Andreas Caesalpinas, the credit of\nprior discovery.\n\nIt remained for another learned physician, a century later, to deal with\nthese counter-claims, and whilst admitting their vague individual\nconceptions of an elusive mystery, to establish once and for ever William\nHarvey's inalienable right as sole discoverer.\n\nThis notable champion was JOHN FREIND, M.D., F.R.S., distinguished as the\nMedical Historian, and Harveian lecturer to the College of Physicians, at\na time when he and his fellows shaved their heads and mounted Ramillies\nwigs as outward guarantees for the profundity of wisdom they enshrined.\n\nBut apart from his flowing wig, or his defence of Harvey, or his learned\nmedical history, written in part when he was a prisoner in the Tower for\nsupposed complicity in the Atterbury Plot, or for skill in the treatment\nof disease, John Freind had a pioneer's claim to distinction.\n\nThe doctor, strange to say, was a Member of Parliament, and on resuming\nhis seat on his release from incarceration, he brought before the House of\nCommons, in 1725, a remarkable petition from the Royal College of\nPhysicians, to restrain \"the pernicious use of spirituous liquors.\" And\nthough he might speak but as the mouthpiece of his brother Fellows, it\nneeded no small degree of courage to broach such a subject in those days\nof general coarse indulgence among all classes; especially if his own\nlanguage was as direct and forcible as that of the petitioners.\n\nTherefore, in his triple character as the historian of medicine, as the\nchampion of William Harvey, and as the foremost M.P. to advocate the\ncause of temperance before our national legislative assembly, John Freind,\nM.D., claims a niche in our Walhalla of notable old doctors.\n\nIn the nave of Westminster Abbey on a memorial of polished granite is this\ninscription--\"Beneath are deposited the remains of JOHN HUNTER, born at\nLong Calderwood, Lanarkshire, N.B., on February 14th, 1728; died in London\non October 10th, 1793. His remains were removed from the Church of St.\nMartins-in-the-Fields to this Abbey on March 28th, 1858. The Royal College\nof Surgeons of England have placed this table over the grave of Hunter to\nrecord their admiration of his genius as a gifted interpreter of the\nDivine power and wisdom that works in the laws of organic life, and their\ngrateful veneration for his services to mankind as the Father of\nscientific surgery. 'O Lord, how manifold are Thy works; in wisdom hast\nThou made them all.'\"\n\nSuch honours are not paid to the remains of men of common stamp. And of no\ncommon stamp was the sandy-headed youth who, having spent ten years of his\nlife learning cabinet making, resolved on striking out a better career for\nhimself; and in his twentieth year took horse and journeyed to London to\nplace himself under his elder brother, WILLIAM HUNTER, then rising into\nnote as a medical practitioner and a teacher of anatomy. In October, 1748,\nhe entered his brother's dissecting room, and whether the fitting of\njoints in cabinetware had been of initiatory service, or he had had access\nto the books of his medical relations in Glasgow, or that as a boy upon\nhis father's farm, observation of the domestic animals and of the wild\ninhabitants of wood and fell, had roused the desire to master the secrets\nof animated nature, sure it is that William speedily foretold a successful\nfuture for his new pupil as an anatomist.\n\nAt all events he used his interest to place his promising brother under\nthe eminent surgeon of Chelsea Hospital, and later under another at St.\nBartholomew's. Then, shocked by the rough speech and manners of his\ncountrified brother, and his need of education, the classical elder packed\nhim off to college to pick up a little refinement along with Latin and\nGreek.\n\nIn vain. Irrepressible and hot-tempered John could not sit down quietly to\nstudy dead languages. Back he came from Oxford in haste, to study dead\nbodies in his brother's dissecting room, and serve as demonstrator to his\ncourse of lectures, simultaneously with his study of living bodies at St.\nGeorge's Hospital, where in a comparatively short time he became\nhouse-surgeon.\n\nHis appointment as staff-surgeon to our troops on foreign service marked\nthe six intervening years before he settled down to practise in London. He\nhad laboured ten years on human anatomy, and had dissected a number of the\nlower animals, laying the foundation of his collection of comparative\nanatomy. Even while on foreign service he had amused himself with studying\nthe digestive faculties of snakes and lizards when in a torpid state, and\nmany were the contributions he sent home to his brother's museum.\n\nHis return to London, as a teacher of surgery and anatomy, was a marked\nsuccess, though private practice had to grow. In 1776, he was appointed\nsurgeon extraordinary to His Majesty George III., but eleven years prior\nto this was admitted a Fellow of the Royal Society, slightly in advance of\nhis elder brother. Then in 1768, the bachelor, William, shifted himself\nand his museum from Jermyn Street to Windmill Street, and resigned the\nlease to John, thus securing independent action to the latter, and\nfacilities for creating a natural-history museum of his own.\n\nHitherto, the brothers had worked together in unison, but now John\ncommitted the unpardonable offence of bringing home to Jermyn Street \"a\ntocherless bride,\" fourteen years younger than himself, endowed only with\nbeauty and accomplishments, and a faculty for filling the house with\nassemblies of wit and fashion, which blunt-spoken John designated\n\"kick-ups,\" no doubt with an irreverent big D as a prefix, swearing being\nas characteristic as hard work.\n\nAnd work hard he did, early and late, not merely to maintain his extensive\nand lucrative practice, but to provide and prepare subjects for the museum\nin the rear of his town house, and for the valuable and original lectures\nhe delivered in language forcible and clear, if neither refined nor\nacademic.\n\nHis chief workshop, so to speak, was at his country \"Box\" at Earl's Court,\nthe grounds of which he had converted into a zoological garden, so many\nwild animals were there kept for study. There is a story told of his\nfacing an escaped lion and flicking him back to his den with his pocket\nhandkerchief, showing his fearlessness and his knowledge of leonine\nnature.\n\nAnother tale is told of his intervention between fighting dogs and\nleopards, he dragging the infuriated leopards back to their cage by their\ncollars--and _fainting_ when the feat was accomplished, for his was not a\nburly frame, and his heart was in a threatening condition.\n\nAn element of humour mingles with the gruesome in Sir B. W. Richardson's\naccount of the ruse employed to cheat watchful executors, and obtain the\nbody of O'Brien the Irish Giant,[2] so as to convert it into the skeleton\nnow in the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, Lincoln's\nInn.\n\nThose were the days when surgeons were not particular where they obtained\nsubjects for their scalpels, whether from the resurrection men or from the\ngallows, and John Hunter was not more dainty than his fellows. But also\nfrom travelling shows and menageries, and from animals that died in the\nTower he was supplied. And so rapidly did his museum grow, absorbing the\nbulk of his income, that ere long he had to remove to what is now\nLeicester Square, and erect a building in the rear for his collection.\n\nHonours fell upon him thickly as they had fallen on his brother, alike\nBritish and foreign, of which he took little heed, absorbed as he was in\nthe pursuit of knowledge, and its demonstration. His discoveries placed\nhim far ahead of the science of his time, though his courtly brother,\nearlier in the field and first to leave it, ran him close. Indeed their\nfinal quarrel and alienation arose out of a disputed claim to a certain\ndiscovery in feminine physiology, brought before the Royal Society, a\nquarrel which transferred William's museum to the University of Glasgow,\nand excluded John from his will.\n\nThe so-called \"Lyceum Medicum\" in Leicester Square, became the home of the\n\"Society for the Improvement of Medical and Chirurgical Knowledge,\" and\nthe \"Philosophical Transactions\" of the Society testify to the genius and\nuntiring activity of its promoter. How he found time for his many written\nessays and discourses on topics wide apart as \"Gunshot-wounds\" and \"Teeth\"\nis a marvel. No wonder the frail human machine wore out so early. He had\nworked when he should have rested, worked regardless of premonitions and\nattacks John Hunter must have well understood, and died at last at\nsixty-two, a victim of one of those fits of passion no man with a diseased\nheart can indulge in safely.\n\nSetting out originally from the tablet in Westminster Abbey to describe\nwhat manner of man was the old doctor who lay beneath, it became\nimperatively necessary to bracket the two brothers, John and William\nHunter, together, since, according to Sir B. W. Richardson, they were\n\"twins in science,\" if not in birth. Had not William already come to the\nfront when John sought him out, he could not have been his teacher, or\ngiven his younger brother his first start in life, his introduction, or\nhis facilities for study. Then they worked together, became one in\nanatomical discovery, in their zeal for collecting all that illustrated\ntheir theories, all that was rare and curious, into unprecedented museums.\nYet how widely the personalities of the brothers differed. They both stood\nout among contemporaries, yet William, with his slight form, mildly\nrefined face, set off by an unpretentious wig, and delicate hands, under\nlace ruffles, and wide coat cuffs, a classical scholar, an antiquary, a\nnumismatist, as well as a naturalist,--Queen Charlotte's medical referee,\nstepping out from his chariot, gold cane in hand, to visit his courtly\npatients, was the very _beau ideal_ of a fashionable physician of that\nday, one who shone in drawing-rooms as well as in the lecture-hall.\nBlue-eyed John, with high cheek bones, broad, slightly receding forehead,\ntangled red hair, and a shaggy mane of whisker that made his keen face a\ntriangle, tender of heart, yet brusque and coarse of speech, rough in\nmanner as in dress (with not a sign of frill or ruffle), despising\ndilettante coteries, not squeamish in seeking \"subjects,\" passionate and\ndetermined, caring little for empty honours, for money only to swell his\nmuseum, and nothing for courtly circles, though created\nsurgeon-extraordinary to George III., and owing his large practice solely\nto the force of his character, his science, and his skill. So far he was\nhis brother's antithesis. John was a diamond in the rough; William the gem\ncut and polished. And such were the two old doctors to whom England's\nCollege of Surgeons owes its Hunterian Museum; the University of Glasgow\nthe other. Had not the brothers quarrelled, the two would have formed one\ngrand unrivalled collection.\n\nSpace is limited, and so must be our notes of these other celebrated \"old\ndoctors,\" whom it would be invidious to overlook. Of these EDWARD JENNER\nstands prominently out, but he has been already dealt with by another\nhand.\n\nIt is scarcely possible to pass by JOHN ABERNETHY, F.R.S., the eccentric\nphysician, whose principle was that men should eat to live, not live to\neat, who maintained that the stomach was the chief seat of health or\ndisease, according as it was used or abused, and that water was the one\nnatural and nutrient beverage. The practical way in which he illustrated\nhis theories respecting overfeeding,--filling a pail with food from\nvarious dishes in correspondence with the heterogeneous mixture on his\npatients' plates--and his brusque replies to some other of his patients,\nhave perpetuated his name through his oddities, rather than as a\nbenefactor of his kind, who revolutionized the medical practice of his\ntime, and of course excited envy and antagonism. His hair, kept together\nat the nape of the neck with a ribbon tie, was brushed back from his\nforehead, and added a degree of sharpness to his somewhat hatchet-shaped\nface, when he told the timorous lady who was \"afraid she had swallowed a\nspider,\" \"Then put a fly in your mouth, madam, and the spider will come up\nto catch him.\" Or when he threw the shilling from his fee back to a mother\nwith a delicate daughter, \"Take that, madam, and buy her a skipping-rope,\"\nan intimation that exercise was needed. It was an age of coarse feeding\nand strong drinking, an age of drastic purges and much blood-letting, and\nAbernethy's temperance principles, so much in advance of his time,\nprovoked considerable opposition from his medical brethren, whose\nsatirical epigrams he was not slow to cap.\n\nBut contemporary squibs and satires cannot affect the real good which has\nmade Abernethy's name a household word. Indeed it has been stamped upon a\nbiscuit. It is stamped also on a medical society he founded at St.\nBartholomew's Hospital, where his centenary has recently been celebrated.\n\nMany have been the contributions to scientific medicine and surgery since\nthe rough days of the old doctors I have endeavoured to chronicle, but\nthese men of wigs and ties, gold-headed canes and pouncet-boxes, breeches\nand buckled shoes, were the pioneers of progress, they cleared the way\nfor the men of this day and generation, and left their mark on their own\nage, not to be effaced by newer and more advanced successors, to whom they\nhave served as stepping-stones.\n\n\n\n\nThe Lee Penny.\n\n\nThe story of the Lee Penny is full of historic interest, and the legends\nrespecting it furnished Sir Walter Scott with some incidents for his novel\nthe \"Talisman.\"\n\nThis amulet is a stone of a deep red colour and triangular shape, in size\nabout half-an-inch on each side, and is set in a silver coin. The various\naccounts which have come under our notice are agreed that this curious\nrelic of antiquity has been in the Lee family since a period immediately\nafter the death of King Robert the Bruce.\n\nThe monarch was nearing his end, and as he lay on his death-bed, he was\nmuch troubled for having failed to visit in person the Holy Land to assist\nin the Crusade. His long war with the English had rendered it impossible\nfor him to leave his kingdom to fight in a foreign land, even in the cause\nof religion.\n\nSir James Douglas, his tried and trusty friend, stood beside the bed of\nhis king, and was in sore distress. As a last request the king implored\nthat as soon as possible after his soul had left his body Douglas would\ntake his heart to Jerusalem. On the honour of a knight, Sir James\nfaithfully promised to discharge the trust.\n\nThe king died in 1329, and his heart was enclosed in a silver case. Sir\nJames suspended it from his neck with a chain, and without delay gathered\nround him a suitable retinue, and made his way towards the Holy Land. He\nwas not destined to reach that country, for on his route the intelligence\nreached him that Alphonso, King of Leon and Castile, was waging war with\nthe Moorish chief, Osmyn of Granada. To assist the Christians, he felt it\nwas his duty, and in accordance with the dying charge of his king. With\ncourage he engaged in the fray, but was soon surrounded by horsemen, and\nhe who had fought so long and bravely, realised that he must meet his doom\nfar from the country he loved so well. He made a desperate effort to\nescape. The precious casket he took from his neck and threw it before him,\nsaying, \"Onward, as thou were wont, thou noble heart! Douglas will follow\nthee.\" He followed it and was slain. After the battle was over the brave\nknight was found resting on the heart of Bruce. The mortal remains of the\nvaliant knight were carried back to his home and buried in his church of\nSt. Bride, at Douglas.\n\nThe heart of Bruce was entrusted to Sir Simon Locard, and by him borne\nback to Scotland, and at last found a resting-place beneath the high altar\nof Melrose Abbey, and its site is still pointed out. Mrs. Hemans wrote a\ncharming poem on Bruce's heart in Melrose Abbey, commencing:--\n\n    \"Heart! that did'st press forward still,\n    Where the trumpet's note rang shrill;\n    Where the knightly swords are crossing,\n    And the plumes like sea-foam tossing,\n    Leader of the charging spear,\n    Fiery heart! and liest thou here?\n    May this narrow spot inurn\n    Aught that could so beat and burn?\"\n\nWe are told the family name of Locard was changed to Lockheart, or\nLockhart, from the circumstance of Sir Simon having carried the key of the\ncasket, and was granted as armorial insignia, heart with a fetter-lock,\nwith the motto, \"Corda serrata pando.\" According to a contributor to\nChambers's \"Book of Days,\" v., 2, p. 415, from the same incident, the\nDouglases bear a human heart, imperially crowned, and have in their\npossession an ancient sword, emblazoned with two hands holding a heart,\nand dated 1329, the year Bruce died.\n\nLockhart was not daunted at the failure of the first attempt to reach\nJerusalem, and, in company with such Scottish knights as escaped the fate\nof their leader, they once more proceeded, and arrived in the Holy Land,\nand for some time fought in the wars against the Saracens.\n\n[Illustration: THE LEE PENNY.]\n\nThe following adventure is said to have befallen him. He made prisoner in\nbattle an Emir of wealth and note. The aged mother of his captive came to\nthe Christian camp to save her son from his captivity. Lockhart fixed the\nprice at which his prisoner should ransom himself; and the lady, pulling\nout a large embroidered purse, proceeded to tell down the amount. In this\noperation, a pebble inserted in a coin, some say of the lower empire, fell\nout of the purse, and the Saracen matron testified so much haste to\nrecover it as to give the Scottish knight a high idea of its value. \"I\nwill not consent,\" he said, \"to grant your son's liberty unless the amulet\nbe added to the ransom.\" The lady not only consented to this, but\nexplained to Sir Simon the mode in which the talisman was to be used. The\nwater in which it was dipped operated as a styptic, or a febrifuge, and\nthe amulet possessed several other properties as a medical talisman.\n\nSir Simon Lockhart, after much experience of the wonders which it wrought,\nbrought it to his own country, and left it to his heirs, by whom, and by\nClyde side in general, it was, and is still, distinguished by the name of\nthe Lee Penny, from the name of his native seat of Lee.\n\nIts virtues were brought into operation by dropping the stone in water\nwhich was afterwards given to the diseased to drink, washing at the same\ntime the part affected. No words were used in dipping the stone, or money\npermitted to be taken by the servants of Lee. People came from all parts\nof Scotland, and many places in England, to carry away the water to give\nto their cattle.\n\nSome interesting information respecting this amulet appears in an account\nof the Sack and Siege of Newcastle-on-Tyne in 1644. \"As one of the natural\nsequences,\" says the writer, \"of prolonged distress, caused by this brave\nbut foolhardy defence against overwhelming odds, the plague broke out\nwith fatal violence in Newcastle and Gateshead, as well as Tynemouth and\nShields, during the following year. Great numbers of poor people were\ncarried off by it; while tents were erected on Bensham Common, to which\nthose infected were removed; and the famous Lee Penny was brought out of\nScotland to be dipped in water for the diseased persons to drink, and the\nresult said to be a perfect cure. The inhabitants (that is to say, the\nCorporation, we presume), gave a bond for a large sum in trust for the\nloan; and they thought the charm did so much good, that they offered to\npay the money down, and keep the marvellous penny with a stone in which it\nis inserted; but the proprietor, Lockhart of Lee, would not part with it.\"\n\nWe are told that many years ago a remarkable cure is alleged to have been\nperformed on Lady Baird of Sauchton Hall, near Edinburgh, who, having been\nbitten by a mad dog, was seized with hydrophobia. The Lee Penny was sent\nfor, and she used it for some weeks, drinking and bathing in the water it\nhad been dipped in, and she quite recovered.\n\n\"The most remarkable part of the history,\" as Sir Walter Scott says,\n\"perhaps was, that it so especially escaped condemnation when the Church\nof Scotland chose to impeach many other cures which savoured of the\nmiraculous, as occasioned by sorcery, and censured the appeal of them,\n'excepting only the amulet called the Lee Penny, to which it pleased God\nto annex certain healing virtues, which the Church did not presume to\ncondemn.'\"\n\nThe Lee Penny is preserved at Lee House, in Lanarkshire, the residence of\nthe present representative of the family.\n\n\n\n\nHow Our Fathers were Physicked.\n\nBY J. A. LANGFORD, LL.D.\n\n\nDelightful old Fuller tells us \"Necessary and ancient their Profession\never since man's body was subject to enmity and casualty.\" There is no\ndoubt of the necessity and antiquity of the doctor's calling, but there\nis, without doubt, no profession in which such great and beneficent\nadvance has been made in modern times as in the medical. The tortures\nwhich our fathers endured under the old treatment are terrible to think\nof. It was not enough that they were afflicted by disease; the pains which\nthey had to suffer from the supposed remedies far exceeded those which\nnature imposed. Cupping, blistering, and especially bleeding, were the\ncommon applications in nearly all complaints, the Bleeding was also used\nas a preventive, which proverb truly tells us \"is better than cure\"; but\nin this case the supposed disease could scarcely have been worse than the\nsupposed prevention. Five times in the year--\"in September, before\nAdvent, before Lent, after Easter, and at Pentecost\"--were the periods at\nwhich men in health were accustomed to \"breathe a vayne.\" Besides letting\nof blood, the physician's cane and the surgeon's club were vigorously used\non the unfortunate sufferers. Mr. J. C. Jeaffreson, in his very\ninteresting \"Book about Doctors,\" says, \"For many centuries fustigation\nwas believed in as a sovereign remedy for bodily ailments as well as moral\nfailings, and a beating was prescribed for an ague as frequently as for\npicking and stealing.\" So what with the lancet and the stick combined, our\nfathers must indeed have shuddered at the approach of any of the \"natural\nshocks that flesh is heir to.\"\n\nThe medicines of those good old times were of a very strange and\nobjectionable kind. Some of the concoctions were composed of many\ningredients, and were formed of abominable, not to say disgusting,\nmaterials. All nature was ransacked for out-of-the-way and horrible things\nwhich could be used as drugs and nostrums for suffering and gullible\nsufferers. In the reign of Charles II., Dr. Thomas Sherley \"recommended a\nclumsy and inordinate administration of violent drugs\" for gout. \"Calomel\nhe habitually administered in simple doses. Sugar of lead he mixed\nlargely in his conserves; pulverized human bones he was very fond of\nprescribing; and the principal ingredient in his gout-powder was 'raspings\nof a human skull unburied.' But his sweetest compound was his 'Balsam of\nBats,' strongly recommended as an unguent for hypochondriacal persons,\ninto which entered adders, bats, sucking-whelps, earth worms, hogs'\ngrease, the marrow of a stag, and the thigh-bone of an ox.\" A good idea of\nthe things sold to a confiding public as cures for its ills may be\ngathered from two verses on Colonel Dalmahoy, a well-known--shall we say\nquack--of the past:--\n\n    \"Dalmahoy sold infusions and lotions,\n      Decoctions, and gargles, and pills,\n    Electuaries, powders, and potions,\n      Spermaciti, salts, scammony, squills.\n\n    Horse aloes, burnt alum, agaric,\n      Balm, benzoine, blood-stone, and dill;\n    Castor, camphor, and acid tartaric,\n      With specifics for every ill.\"\n\nMetals and precious stones were extensively used in the prescriptions of\nbygone doctors. Every metal and every stone was credited with some special\nand peculiar virtue which it alone possessed, and it was applied as a cure\nfor that ailment over which it had influence and power. Bacon tells us,\n\"We know Diseases of Stoppings, and Suffocations, are the most dangerous\nin the body; And it is not much otherwise in the minde. You may take\n_Sarza_ to open the Liver; _Steele_ to open the Spleene; _Flowers of\nSulphur_ for the Lungs; _Castoreum_ for the Braine,\" for each of which\nparts it was believed that the specifics named were most efficacious. The\nprescriptions of Dr. Bulleyn, in the reign of Elizabeth, are wonderful\nexamples of how our fathers were physicked. Here are two of those quoted\nby Mr. Jeaffreson. The first is\n\n\"_An Embrocation._--An embrocation is made after this manner:--Px. Of a\ndecoction of mallowes, vyolets, barly, quince seed, lettice leaves, one\npint; of barly meale, two ounces; of oyle of vyolets and roses, of each,\nan ounce and half; of butter, one ounce; and then seeth them all together\ntill they be like a brouthe, puttyng thereto, at the ende, foure yolkes of\neggs; and the maner of applying is with peeces of cloth, dipped in the\naforesaid decoction, being actually hoate.\"\n\nOur second is \"truly a medicine for kings and noblemen;\" it is called an\n\n\"_Electuarium de Gemmis._--Take two drachms of white perles; two little\npeeces of saphyre; jacinth, corneline, emerauldes, grannettes, of each an\nounce; setwal, the sweete roote dorsnike, the rind of pomecitron, mase,\nbasal seede, of each two drachms; of redde corrall, amber, shewing of\nivory, of each two drachms; rootes both of white and red lichen, ginger,\nlong peper, spicknard, folium indicum, saffron, cardamon, of each one\ndrachm; of troch diarodon, lignum aloes, of each half a small handful;\ncinnamon, galinga, zurnbeth, which is a kind of setwal, of each one drachm\nand a half; thin pieces of gold and sylver, of each half a scruple; of\nmusk, half a drachm. Make your electuary with honey emblici, which is the\nfourth kind of mirobulans with roses, strained in equall partes, as much\nas will suffice. This healeth cold diseases of ye braine, harte, stomack.\nIt is a medicine proved against the tremblynge of the harte, faynting and\nswooning, the weakness of the stomacke, pensiveness, solitarines. Kings\nand noble men have used this for their comfort. It causeth them to be\nbold-spirited, the body to smell wel, and ingendreth to the face good\ncolour.\"\n\nThe most innocent articles used in the old medicines were fruits, and\nherbs, and vegetables. To some kinds special virtues are assigned, and Dr.\nBulleyn's \"Book of Simples,\" is very pleasant reading. \"Pears, apples,\npeaches, quinces, cherries, grapes, raisins, prunes, raspberries, oranges,\nmedlons, raspberries and strawberries, spinage, ginger, and lettuces are\nthe good things thrown upon the board.\" We are told of a prune growing at\nNorwich, and known as the \"black freere's prune,\" that it is \"very\ndelicious and pleasaunt, and no lesse profitable unto a hoate stomacke.\"\n\"The red warden is of greate virtue, conserved, roasted or baken to quench\ncholler.\" We are also informed that \"Figges be good agaynst melancholy,\nand the falling evil, to be eaten. Figges, nuts, and herb grase do make a\nsufficient medicine against poison or the pestilence. Figges make a good\ngargarism to cleanse the throates.\"\n\nSome of the Doctor's prescriptions are very curious. He prescribes \"a smal\nyoung mouse rosted,\" for a child afflicted with a nervous ailment. Nor did\nhe disdain to use the snail in certain cases. He tells us that \"Snayles\nbroken from the shelles and sodden in whyte wyne with oyle and sugar are\nvery holsome, because they be hoat and moist for the straightnes of the\nlungs and cold cough. Snails stamped with camphery, and leven will draw\nforth prycks in the flesh.\" Snail broth is not entirely unknown in some\ncountry places, even at the present time. Bezoar stone and unicorn's horn\nwere also used in confections.\n\nCancer has always been, and unfortunately still is, a terrible and an\nincurable disease, and has afforded a fine field for all kinds of nostrums\nand specifics which were to produce a \"safe and certain cure.\" One of\nthese, called a \"precious water,\" was thus composed. \"Take dove's foote, a\nherb so named, Arkangell ivy with the berries, young red bryer toppes, and\nleaves, whyte roses, theyre leaves and buds, red sage, celandyne and\nwoodbynde, of each lyke quantity, cut or chopped and put into pure cleane\nwhyte wyne, and clarified honey. Then breake into it alum glasse and put\nin a little of the pouder of aloes hepatica. Destill these together softly\nin a limbecke of glasse or pure tin; if not then in a limbecke wherein\naqua vitae is made. Keep this water close. It will not onely kyll the\ncanker (cancer), if it be duly washed therewyth; but also two droppes\ndayly put into the eye wyll sharp the syght, and breake the pearle and\nspottes, specially if it be dropped in wyth a little fenell water, and\nclose the eyes after.\"\n\nIn 1739, the British Parliament passed an Act which is unprecedented in\nthe annals of folly. A female quack, named Joanna Stephens, was reported\nto have effected some most extraordinary cures by the use of a medicine of\nwhich she only possessed the secret. She proposed to make it public for\nthe sum of L5,000, and a vain attempt was made to raise the sum by\nsubscription, but only L1,356 3s. was thus raised. An appeal was made to\nParliament, and a commission was appointed to enquire into the subject,\nand a certificate signed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Bishops, Peers,\nand Physicians, was presented to the House, declaring that they were\n\"convinced by experiment of the utility, efficacy, and dissolving power,\"\nof the tested medicine, and Joanna Stephens was rewarded with the desired\nL5,000. The prescriptions were published, and the following extracts will\nsuffice to show how easily sufferers from diseases may be, and sometimes\nare, gulled. This lucky quack says:--\n\n    \"My medicines are a Powder, a Decoction, and Pills.\"\n\n    \"The Powder consists of egg-shells and snails, both calcined.\"\n\n    \"The Decoction is made by boiling some herbs (together with a ball\n    which consists of soap, swine's-cresses burnt to a blackness, and\n    honey), in water.\"\n\n    \"The Pills consist of snails calcined, wild carrot seeds, burdock\n    seeds, asken keys, hips and hawes, all burnt to a blackness--soap and\n    honey.\"\n\nOur readers will willingly dispense with the directions of how these\ndearly purchased medicines should be prepared. Surely\n\n    \"The pleasure is as great,\n    In being cheated as to cheat!\"\n\nIn 1633, Stephen Brasnell, Physician, published a small volume entitled\n\"Helps | for | Svddain | Accidents | Endangering Life. | By which | Those\nthat live farre from Physitions or Chirurgions | may happily preserve the\nLife | of a true Friend or Neigh-| bour, till such a Man may be | had to\nperfect the Cure. | Collected out of the best authors | for the generall\ngood.\" The following is his prescription for all kinds of poisons:--viz.\n\"the Hoofe of an Oxe cut into parings and boyled with bruised mustard-seed\nin white wine and faire water. The Bloud of a Malard drunke fresh and\nwarme: or els dryed to powder, and so drunke in a draught of white wine.\nThe Bloud of a Stagge also in the same manner. The seeds of Rue and the\nleaves of Betony boyled together in white wine. Or take ij scruples (that\nis fortie graines) of Mithridate; of prepared Chrystall, one dram (that is\nthree score grains), fresh Butter one ounce. Mix all well together.\nSwallow it down by such quantities as you can swallow at once; and drink\npresently upon it a quarter of a pint of the decoction of French Barley,\nor so much of six shillings Beere. Of this I have had happy proofe.\"\n\nThere is a much more effective, though a somewhat revolting prescription\nfor \"those with abilitie.\" \"Take,\" says our seventeenth century physician,\n\"take a sound horse, open his belly alive, take out all his entrayles\nquickly, and put the poysoned partie naked into it all save his head,\nwhile the body of the horse retains his naturall heate, and there let him\nsweat well.\" Our author admits that \"this may be held a strange course,\nbut the same reason that teacheth to devide live pullets and pigeons for\nplague-sores approveth this way of sweating as most apt to draw to itselfe\nall poysons from the heart and principall parts of the patient's body.\nBut during this time of sweating he must defend his braine by wearing on\nhis head a quilt.\" The quilt is to be made by taking a number of dried\nherbs, which are to be made into a \"grosse powder and quilt them up in\nsarsnet or calico, and let it be so big as to cover all the head like a\ncap, then binde it on fast with a kerchief.\" This is called \"a Nightcap to\npreserve the Brain.\"\n\nThere are also curious prescriptions for the stings of bees and wasps, the\n\"bitings of spiders,\" of which he says \"the garden ones are the worst.\" He\ntells us that the \"flesh of the same beast that biteth, inwardly taken,\nhelpeth much,\" and that \"outwardly the best thing to be applied is the\nflesh of the same beast that did the hurt, pounded in a morter and applied\nin manner of a poultis.\" Here is one about that pretty little animal, the\nshrew-mouse: \"Now the shrew-mouse is a little kind of a mouse with a long\nsharpe snout and a short tayle; it liveth commonly in old ruinous walls.\nIt biteth also very venomously, and leaveth foure small perforations made\nby her foure foreteeth. To cure her biting, her flesh roasted and eaten is\nthe best inward antidote if it may be had. And outwardly apply her warme\nliver and skin if it may be had. Otherwise _Rocket-reeds_ beaten into\npowder, and mixed with the bloud of a dog. Or els the teeth of a dead man\nmade into a fine powder.\"\n\nThe toad comes in for a good share of attention, and Mr. Bradwell gives a\npersonal anecdote on this subject. He says:--\"Myself, while I was a\nstudent at _Cambridge_, was so hurt by the spouting of a venomous humour\nfrom the body of a great toad into my face while I pashed him to death\nwith a brickbat. Some of the moisture lighted on my right eye, which did\nnot a little endanger it, and hath made it ever since apt to receive any\nflux of Rheume or Inflammation.\" Some of our readers may think that this\nwas a fit punishment for having \"pashed\" the toad to \"death with a\nbrickbat.\"\n\nAmong the strangest things ever used as medicine must be placed human\nskulls. In 1854, Mr. T. A. Trollope gave a short account in _Notes and\nQueries_ of a book by Dr. Cammillo Brunoni, published at Fabriano in 1726.\nIt was entitled _Il Medico Poeta_ (the Physician a Poet), and gives an\naccount \"of the medical uses of human skulls.\" Dr. Brunoni informs us,\nsays Mr. Trollope, that \"all skulls are not of equal value. Indeed, those\nof persons who have died a natural death, are good for little or nothing.\nThe _reason_ of this is, that the disease of which they died has consumed\nor dissipated the essential spirit! The skulls of murderers and bandits\nare particularly efficacious. And this is clearly because not only is the\nessential spirit of the cranium concentrated therein by the nature of\ntheir violent death, but also the force of it is increased by the long\nexposure to the atmosphere, occasioned by the heads of such persons being\nordinarily placed on spikes over the gates of cities! Such skulls are used\nin various manners. Preparations of volatile salt, spirit, gelatine,\nessence, etc., are made from them, and are very useful in epilepsy and\nhoemorrhage. The notion soldiers have, that drinking out of a skull\nrenders them invulnerable in battle, is a mere superstition, though\nrespectable writers do maintain that such a practice is a proved\npreventive against scrofula.\"\n\nThis very curious book consists of a \"poem in twelve cantos, or\n'Capitoli,' as from the fifteenth century downwards it was the Italian\nfashion to call them, on the physical poet--a sort of medical _ars\npoetica_; and followed by a hundred and seventy-two sonnets on all\ndiseases, drugs, parts of the body, functions of them, and curative\nmeans. Each sonnet is printed on one page, while that opposite is occupied\nby a compendious account in prose of the subject in hand. We have a sonnet\non the stomach-ache, a sonnet on apoplexy, a sonnet on purges, another on\nblisters, and many others on far less mentionable subjects. The author's\npoetical view of the action of a black-dose compares it to that of a tidy\nand active housemaid, who, having swept together all the dirt in the room,\nthrows it out of the window. Mystic virtues are attributed to a variety of\nsubstances, animal, vegetable, and mineral.\"\n\nThat delightful work, The Memoirs of the Verney Family, by Lady Verney,\naffords some very striking examples of the medical treatment of poor\nsuffering humanity in the 17th century. Our selections are from the third\nvolume.\n\nOne of the most extraordinary medicines of this, or of any age, was\nwithout doubt that known as Venice Treacle. In 1651, Sir Ralph Verney was\nin Venice, and the Memoirs furnish the following graphic account of this\nterrible drug, which was a concoction of the most disgusting materials.\nSir Ralph sends it to Mrs. Isham, for her family medicine chest, and says\n\"hee that is most famous for Treacle is called Sig{r} Antonio Sgobis, and\nkeepes shopp at the Strazzo, or Ostridge, sopra il ponte de'Baretteri, on\nthe right hand going towards St. Mark's. His price is 19 livres (Venize\nmoney) a pound, and hee gives leaden Potts with the Ostridge signe uppon\nthem, and Papers both in Italian and Lattin to show its virtue.\" \"This\ncelebrated and incredibly nasty compound,\" adds Lady Verney,\n\"traditionally composed by Nero's physician, was made of vipers, white\nwine, and opium, 'spices from both the Indies,' liquorice, red roses, tops\nof germander, juice of rough aloes, seeds of treacle mustard, tops of St.\nJohn's wort, and some twenty other herbs, to be mixed with honey 'triple\nthe weight of all the dry species' into an electuary.\" The recipe is given\nas late as 1739, in Dr. Quincey's \"English Dispensatory,\" published by\nThomas Longman, at the Ship in Paternoster Row. \"Vipers are essential, and\nto get the full benefit of them 'a dozen vipers should be put alive into\nwhite wine.' The English doctor, anxious for the credit of British vipers,\nproves that Venice treacle may be made as well in England, 'though their\ncountry is hotter, and so may the more rarify the viperime juices'; yet\nthe bites of our vipers at the proper time of year, which is the hottest,\nare as efficacious and deadly as them. But he complains that the name of\nVenice goes so far, that English people 'please themselves much with\nbuying a Tin Pot at a low price of a dirty sailor ... with directions in\nthe Italian tongue, printed in London,' and that some base druggists 'make\nthis wretched stuff of little else than the sweepings of their shops.' Sir\nRalph could pride himself that his leaden pots contained the genuine\nhorror. It was used as 'an opiate when some stimulus is required at the\nsame time'; an overdose was confessedly dangerous, and even its advocates\nallowed that Venice treacle did not suit everyone, because, forsooth,\n'honey disagrees with some particular constitutions.'\" For centuries this\nmedical \"horror\" was taken by our drastically treated forefathers.\n\nThe treatment was indeed drastic, and we might truly add cruel. Tom Verney\nhad \"a tertian ague and a feaver,\" and for this he had \"only a vomit,\nglister, a cordiall, and breathed a vane\"--that is, was bled. Another\npatient, Sir George Wheler, who had caught a chill after dancing, had all\nsorts of \"Applications of Blisters and Laudanums,\" so that his Christmas\ndinner at Dr. Denton's cost him \"the best part of 100 pounds.\" For an\neruption in the leg, Sir Ralph Verney was advised to apply a lotion \"so\nvirulent, a drop would fech of the skin when it touched.\"\n\nYoung Edmund Verney was ill in 1657, and writes to his father, \"Truly I\nmight compare my afflictions to Job's. I have taken purges and vomits,\npills and potions, I have been blooded, and I doe not know what I have not\nhad, I have had so many things.\" In 1657-58 the epidemic known as \"The New\nDisease,\" proved very fatal, and created quite a panic. The treatment\nadopted by the doctors may be gathered from a prescription of Dr.\nDenton's, one of the most famous physicians of the time. He writes to Sir\nRalph Verney, \"I see noe danger of Wm. R., and if he had followed your\nadvice by taking of a vomit, and if that had not done it, then to have\nbeene blooded, I beleeved he had beene well ere this.\" Then he adds \"It is\nthe best thinge and the surest and the quickest he can yet doe, therefore\nI pray lett him have one yett. 3 full spoonfulls of the vomitage liquor in\npossitt drinke will doe well, and he may abide 4 the same night when he\ngoes to rest; let him take the weight of vi{ds} of diascordium the next\nday or the next but one; he may be blooded in the arm about 20 ounces.\"\n\nSome of the ladies of the time did not, however, approve of this kind of\ntreatment, and preferred their own remedies, or their own notions of\nremedies, to the doctor's prescriptions. We select two examples. Lady\nFanshawe described the disease as \"a very ill kind of fever, of which many\ndied, and it ran generally through all families.\" While she suffered from\nit she ate \"neither flesh, nor fish, nor bread, but sage possett drink, a\npancake or eggs, or now and then a turnip or carrott.\" But Lady Hobart\nventured to prescribe. She writes, \"If you have a new dises in your town\npray have a car of yourself, and goo to non of them; but drink good ale\nfor the gretis cordall that is: I live by the strength of your malt.\" Few,\nwe anticipate, would object to her ladyship's advice, and most would\nprefer her \"good ale\" to Dr. Denton's \"vomitts,\" and the loss of 20 ounces\nof blood.\n\nOur illustrations might be indefinitely multiplied, but those given will\namply suffice to show the way in which our fathers were physicked.\n\n\n\n\nMedical Folk-Lore.\n\nBY JOHN NICHOLSON.\n\n\nTo ease pain and endeavour to effect a cure, man will try every suggested\nremedy, likely and unlikely, and when numberless things have been tried,\neach of which was alleged to be a certain cure, he reverts to some simple\nthing, taught him by his old grandmother, or the \"wise woman\" of his early\ndays; and which, by reason of its simplicity, had been at first\ncontemptuously rejected in favour of more complex but inefficacious\ncompounds. There is scarcely a market but has a stall kept by a herb\nwoman, who, in warm old-fashioned hood, with a little shawl round her\nshoulders, her ample waist encircled by broad tapes from which is\nsuspended a pocket, capacious and indispensable, lays out with great care\nher stock of simples--roots, leaves, or flowers, studiously gathered at\nthe proper time, when their virtue is strongest. Here may be seen poppy\nheads for fomentation, dandelion roots for liver complaint, ground ivy for\nrheumatism, celandine for weak eyes, and other herbs, all \"for the\nservice of man,\" to alleviate or cure some of the \"ills that flesh is heir\nto.\" She can relate wondrous tales of marvellous cures wrought by her\nwares, of cases, long standing, and given up by the duly qualified medical\nfraternity, a brotherhood she holds in contempt because of their\nnew-fangled remedies and methods.\n\nThis chapter, however, deals chiefly with superstitious remedies, or at\nleast those remedies which seem to have no scientific bearing on the case;\nthus, a person having a sty on the eye, will have it rubbed with a wedding\nring, or the gold ring of a young maiden; or cause it to be well brushed\nseven times with a black cat's tail, if the cat were willing. Another cure\nis more efficacious if administered as a surprise. The patient is placed\nin front of the operator, who unexpectedly spits on the eye affected;\nwhich action often leads to angry remonstrance, met by derisive laughter,\nwhich causes, it may be, broken friendship and general unpleasantness for\na time.\n\nIt is a common belief, almost world-wide in its extent, that toothache is\ncaused by a little worm which gnaws a hole in the tooth. Not long ago I\nwas shewn a large molar, which when _in situ_ had caused its owner great\npain, and he pointed to the nerve apertures, saying, \"That's where the\nworm was!\" Shakespeare, in \"Much Ado About Nothing,\"[3] speaks of this\ncurious belief:--\n\n    \"_D. Pedro._ What! sigh for the toothache?\n\n    _Leon._ Where is but a humour or a worm.\"\n\n\"This superstition was common some years ago in Derbyshire, where there\nwas an odd way of extracting, as it was thought, the worm. A small\nquantity of a mixture, consisting of dried and powdered herbs, was placed\nin a tea-cup or other small vessel, and a live coke from the fire was\ndropped in. The patient then held his or her open mouth over the cup, and\ninhaled the smoke as long as it could be borne. The cup was then taken\naway, and a fresh cup or glass, containing water, was then put before the\npatient. Into this cup the patient breathed hard for a few moments, and\nthen, it was supposed, the grub or worm could be seen in the water.\"[4]\n\nThe following was communicated to the _Folk Lore Journal_ by Wm. Pengelly,\nEsq., Torquay, February 1st, 1884:--\n\n    \"Upwards of sixty years ago, a woman at Looe, in south-east Cornwall,\n    complained to a neighbouring woman that she was suffering from\n    toothache, on which the neighbour remarked that she could give a charm\n    of undoubted efficacy. It was to be in writing, and worn constantly\n    about the person; but, unfortunately, it would be valueless if the\n    giver and receiver were of the same sex. This difficulty was obviated\n    by calling in my services, and requesting me to write from dictation\n    the following words:--\n\n    'Peter sat in the gate of Jerusalem. Jesus cometh unto him and saith,\n    \"Peter, what aileth thee?\" He saith, \"Lord, I am grievously tormented\n    with the toothache.\" He saith, \"Arise, Peter, and follow me.\" He did\n    so, and immediately the toothache left him; and he followed him in the\n    name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.'\n\n    The charm, being found to be correctly written, was held to have been\n    presented to me by the dictator. I at once gave it to the sufferer,\n    who placed it in a small bag and wore it round her neck.\"\n\nA Roumanian charm against toothache is to sit beside an anthill, masticate\na crust of bread, spit it out over the anthill, and as the ants eat the\nbread the toothache will cease.\n\nSome believe that if you pick the aching tooth with the nail of an old\ncoffin, or drink the water taken from the tops of three waves, the\nwearying pain may be relieved or cured. In Norfolk, the toothache is\ncalled the \"love pain,\" and the sufferer does not receive much sympathy.\n\nSome time ago, a man wished to shew me some antiquity he had found, but\nhis jacket pocket was so filled with odds and ends (\"kelterment,\" he\ncalled it) that he turned all out in order to better prosecute his search.\nAmong the miscellaneous collection I noticed a potato, withered, dry,\nhard, and black; and was informed it was kept as a preventive and cure for\nrheumatism. For the same distressing, disabling disease, some people\nspread treacle on brown paper, and apply hot to the part affected.\n\nThe following curious passages have been transcribed by my friend, Mr.\nGeorge Neilson, solicitor, Glasgow, from the Kirk Session Records of the\nparish of Gretna, and are here inserted by his consent, most freely\ngiven:--\n\n    \"GRAITNEY KIRK, _Feb. 11, 1733_.\n\n    Session met after Sermon.\n\n    It was represented by some of the members that the Charms and Spells\n    used at Watshill for Francis Armstrong, Labouring under distemper of\n    mind, gave great offence, and 'twas worth while to enquire into the\n    affair and publickly admonish the people of the evil of such a course,\n    that a timely stop be put to such a practice.\n\n    Several of the members gave account that in Barbara Armstrang's they\n    burned Rowantree and Salt, they took three Locks of Francis's hair,\n    three pieces of his shirt, three roots of wormwood, three of mugwort,\n    three pieces of Rowantree, and boiled alltogether, anointed his Legs\n    with the water, and essayed to put three sups in his mouth, and\n    meantime kept the door close, being told by Isabel Pott, at Cross, in\n    Rockcliff commonly called the Wise Woman, that the person who had\n    wronged him would come to the door, but no access was to be given.\n    Francis, tho' distracted, told them they were using witch-craft and\n    the Devils Charms that would do no good. It is said they carried a\n    candle around the bed for one part of the inchantment. John Neilson,\n    in Sarkbridge, declared before the Session this was matter of fact\n    others then present. Mary Tate, Servant to John Neilson in Sarkbridge\n    is to be cited as having gone to the Wise Woman for Consultation.\"\n\n\n    \"GRAITNEY KIRK, _Feb. 25, 1733_.\n\n    Session met after Sermon\n\n    Mary Tate having been summoned was called on, and compearing confessed\n    that she had gone to Isabel Pot, in the parish of Rockcliff, and\n    declared that the s{d} Isabell ordered South running water to be\n    lifted in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and to be boiled\n    at night in the house where Francis Armstrong was, with nettle roots,\n    wormwood, mugwort, southernwood and rowantree, and his hands, legs and\n    temples be stroaked therewith, and three sups to be put in his mouth,\n    and withal to keep the door close: She ordered also three locks of his\n    hair to be burnt in the fire with three pieces clipt out of his shirt,\n    and a Slut, _i.e._, a rag dipt in tallow to be lighted and carried\n    round his bed, and all to be kept secret except from near friends:\n    Mary Tate declared that the said Francis would allow none to touch him\n    but her, and at last Helen Armestrange, Spouse to Archibald Crighton,\n    Elder, assisted her, and after all the said Francis, tho' distracted,\n    told them they were using witchcrafts and the Devil's Charms that\n    would do no good: Mary Tate being admonished of the Evil of such a\n    course was removed: Notwithstanding her acknowledgments of her fault\n    she is to be suspended _a sacris_, and others her accomplices, and\n    that none hereafter pretend Ignorance the Congregation is to be\n    cautioned against such a practice from the Pulpit.\"\n\nAgue used to be much more prevalent than it now is. Drainage and\nsanitation have banished many evils, and with the evil, the exorcists'\ncharm for the banishment of the evil. Charms, rather than medical\nremedies, for the cure of ague, are very prevalent. Rider's _British\nMerlin_ for 1715 lies before me. It is a thin 16mo. booklet of 48 printed\npages and 42 blank pages, but some of the blank inter-leaves have been\ntorn out. It is bound in parchment with gilt edges, and has had a clasp,\nwhich has disappeared. One of the interleaves bears this written\ncharm:--\"And Peter sat at the gate of Jerusalem and prayed, and Jesus\ncalled Peter, and Peter said, Lord, I am sick of an ague, and the evil\nague being dismissed, Peter said, Lord, grant that whosoever weareth these\nlines in writing, the evil ague may depart from them, and from all evil\nague good Lord deliver us.\" The following charm is taken from an old diary\nof 1751[5]:--\"When Jesus came near Pilate, He trembled like a leaf, and\nthe judge asked Him if He had the ague. He answered, He had neither the\nague, nor was He afraid; and whosoever bears these words in mind shall\nnever fear ague or anything else.\" A strange charm for this dreaded\ndisease was to be spoken up the wide cavernous chimney by the eldest\nfemale of the family on St. Agnes' Eve. Thus spake she:--\n\n    \"Tremble and go!\n    First day shiver and burn;\n    Tremble and quake!\n    Second day shiver and learn;\n    Tremble and die!\n    Third day never return.\"\n\nA curious anecdote is related of Lord Chief Justice Holt. When a young\nman, he, with companions who were law students like himself, ran up a\nscore at an inn, which they were not able to pay. Mr. Holt observed that\nthe landlord's daughter looked very ill, and, posing as a medical student,\nasked what ailed her. He was informed she suffered from ague. Mr. Holt,\ncontinuing to play the doctor, gathered sundry herbs, mixed them with\ngreat ceremony, rolled them up in parchment, scrawled some characters on\nthe same, and to the great amusement of his companions, tied it round the\nneck of the young woman, who straightway was cured of her ague. After the\ncure, the pretending doctor offered to pay the bill, but the grateful\nlandlord and father would not consent, and allowed the party to leave the\nhouse with hearts as light as their pockets.\n\nMany years after, when on the Bench, a woman was brought before him\naccused of witchcraft. She denied the charge, but said she had a wonderful\nball, which never failed to cure the ague. The charm was handed to the\njudge, who recognised it as the very ball he had made for the young woman\nat the inn, to help himself and his companions out of a difficult\nposition.[6]\n\nIn the west of England a live snail is sewn up in a bag and worn round the\nneck as an antidote for ague; though others in the same district imprison\na spider in a box, and, as it pines away, so will the disease depart.\n\nIt is a common belief in the north of England that a person bitten by a\ndog is liable to madness, if the dog which bit them goes mad. In order to\nsecure the bitten one from such a terrible fate, the owner of the dog is\noften compelled to destroy it. Should he refuse to do so, the friends of\nthe injured party would probably poison it, The condition peculiar to the\nmorning following a night of debauchery, is said to need \"a hair of the\ndog that bit you,\" which doubtless refers to the means taken to prevent\nill effects following a dog bite. A wise saw from the Edda tells us that\n\"Dog's hair heals dog's bite.\" The following incident recorded in the\n_Pall Mall Gazette_, Oct. 12th, 1866, shews most gross superstition in\nthis Victorian age. \"At an inquest, held on the 5th of October, at\nBradfield, (Bucks.), on the body of a child of five years of age, which\nhad died of hydrophobia, evidence was given of a practice almost\nincredible in civilised England. Sarah Mackness stated that at the request\nof the mother of the deceased, she had fished out of the river the body of\nthe dog by which the child had been bitten, and had extracted its liver, a\nslice of which she had frizzled before the fire, and had then given it to\nthe child to be eaten with some bread. The dog had been drowned nine days\nbefore. The child ate the liver greedily, drank some tea afterwards, but\ndied, in spite of this strange specific.\"\n\nErysipelas in Donegal is known as the \"rose.\" It is very common, but can\nbe cured by a stroker. The following is said to have happened. A nurse of\na Rector had the \"rose,\" and the doctor was called in. After he was gone,\nthe woman's friends brought in a stroker, who rubbed the nurse with bog\nmoss, and then threw a bucket of bogwater over her in bed. This treatment\ncured the woman, and is said to be generally in vogue, but is not\nefficient except the right person does it.[7] In some parts of Yorkshire,\nsheep's dung is applied as a poultice for the cure of erysipelas.\n\nWhat is more distressing, both to patient and nurse, than whooping cough,\nor king-cough, as it is sometimes called? A change of air is deemed\nbeneficial to the afflicted one, so the mothers of Hull take their\nsuffering children across the Humber to New Holland and back again. Some\ncall it \"crossing strange water.\" Other people procure a \"hairy worm,\" and\nsuspend it in a flannel cover round the neck of the sufferer, in the\nbelief that as the creature dies and wastes away, so will the cough\ndepart. This custom seems to be the relic of an old belief that something\nof the nature of a hairy caterpillar was the cause of the cough, and Mr.\nTylor, in his _Primitive Culture_,[8] speaks of the ancient\nhomoeopathic doctrine that what hurts will also cure. In Gloucestershire\nroasted mouse is considered a specific for whooping cough; though in\nYorkshire the same diet cure is adopted for croup, while rat pie is the\none to be used for whooping cough. The Norfolk peasants tie up a common\nhouse spider in a piece of muslin, and when the luckless long-legged\nspinner dies, the cough will soon disappear. A correspondent of _Notes and\nQueries_ states that when staying in a village in Oxfordshire, he was\ninformed by an old woman that she and her brothers were cured of whooping\ncough in the following way. They were required to go, the first thing in\nthe morning, to a hovel at a little distance from their house, where a fox\nwas kept. They carried with them a large can of milk, which was set down\nbefore the fox, and when he had taken as much as he cared to drink, the\nchildren shared among them what was left. The _Aberdeen Evening Gazette_\nof 24th August, 1882, tells of a curious superstition in Lochee:--\n\n    \"Hooping-cough being rather prevalent in Lochee at the present time,\n    various cures are resorted to with the view of allaying the distress.\n    Amongst these the old 'fret' of passing a child beneath the belly of a\n    donkey has come in for a share of patronage. A few days ago, two\n    children living with their parents in Camperdown Street, were\n    infected with the malady. A hawker's cart, with a donkey yoked to it,\n    happening to pass, the mothers thought this an excellent opportunity\n    to have their little ones relieved of their hacking cough. The donkey\n    was accordingly stopped, the children were brought forth, and the\n    ceremony began. The mothers, stationed at either side of the donkey,\n    passed and repassed the little creatures underneath the animal's\n    belly, and with evident satisfaction appeared to think that a cure\n    would in all probability be effected. Nor was this all; a piece of\n    bread was next given to the donkey to eat, one of the women holding\n    her apron beneath its mouth to catch the crumbs which might fall.\n    These were given to the children to eat, so as to make the cure\n    effectual. Whether these strange proceedings have resulted in\n    banishing the dreaded cough or not, has not been ascertained, and\n    probably never will be. A few years ago, the custom was quite common\n    in this quarter, but with the spread of education the people generally\n    know better than to attempt to cure hooping-cough through the agency\n    of a donkey.\"\n\nThe _North British Mail_ for 20th March 1883, among other superstitions in\nTiree, says, \"On the west side of the island there is a rock with a hole\nin it, through which children are passed when suffering from\nwhooping-cough or other complaints.\"\n\nIt is a common belief that if you wash your hands in water in which eggs\nhave been boiled, warts will make their appearance; also, that the blood\nof a wart will cause other warts. Anyhow, if the warts be there, they can\neither be cured or charmed away. The writer once had a row of warts,\nthirteen in number, on his left arm. He was told by an aged dame, who sat\non a three-legged stool before her cottage door, smoking a short black\npipe, to take thirteen bad peas, throw them over his left shoulder, never\nheeding where they went, all the while repeating some incantation, which\nhas been forgotten.\n\nCures are effected by rubbing the warts with something, which is\nafterwards allowed to decay. Some rub the warts with a grey snail or slug,\nand then impale the poor creature on a thorn; others steal a bit of beef,\nnot so much as Taffy made off with, rub the beef on the warts, and then\nbury the beef. Lord Bacon, in his _Natural History_, says:--\"I had from my\nchildhood a wart upon one of my fingers; afterwards, when I was about\nsixteen years old, being then at Paris, there grew upon both my hands a\nnumber of warts, at the least an hundred in a month's space. The English\nAmbassador's lady, who was a woman far from superstitious, told me one day\nshe would help me away with my warts: whereupon she got a piece of lard\nwith the skin on, and rubbed the warts all over with the fat side; and\namong the rest, the wart which I had from my childhood; then she nailed\nthe piece of lard, with the fat towards the sun, upon a post of her\nchamber window, which was to the south. The success was, that within five\nweeks' space all the warts went quite away; and that wart which I had so\nlong endured, for company.... They say the like is done by the rubbing of\nwarts with a green elder stick, and then burying the stick to rot in\nmuck.\"\n\nIn Withal's _Dictionary_ (1608) there is the following couplet:--\n\n    \"The bone of a haire's foot closed in a ring,\n    Will drive away the cramp whenas it doth wing,\"\n\nbut Pepys, who tells us the whole of his experience, with comments\nthereon, used a hare's foot as a charm for colic. He says:--(20 Jan.\n1664-5) \"Homeward, in my way buying a hare and taking it home, which arose\nupon my discourse to-day with Mr. Batten in Westminster Hall, who showed\nme my mistake, that my hare's foot hath not the joynt in it, and assures\nme he never had the cholique since he carried it about him; and it is a\nstrange thing how fancy works, for I no sooner handled his foot but I\nbecame very well, and so continue.\"\n\n(22nd.) \"Now mighty well, and truly I can but impute it to my fresh hare's\nfoot.\"\n\n(March 26) \"Now I am at a loss to know whether it be my hare's foot which\nis my preservation; for I never had a fit of collique since I wore it, or\nwhether it be my taking a pill of turpentine every morning.\"\n\nThe following newspaper cutting from the _Boston Herald_, 7th February,\n1837, is worth preserving:--\n\n    \"Nothing could be more absurd than the notions regarding some of these\n    supposed cures; a ring made of a hinge of a coffin had the power of\n    relieving cramps, which were also mitigated by having a rusty old\n    sword hanging up by the bedside. Nails driven in an oak tree prevented\n    the toothache. A halter that had served in hanging a criminal was an\n    infallible remedy for a head-ache when tied round the head; this\n    affection was equally cured by the moss growing upon the human skull\n    taken as cephalic snuff dried and pulverised. A dead man's hand could\n    dissipate tumours of the glands, by stroking the part nine times; but\n    the hand of a man who had been cut down from the gallows was the most\n    efficacious. The chips of a gallows on which several had been hanged,\n    when worn in a bag round the neck would cure the ague. A stone with a\n    hole in it, suspended at the head of a bed, would effectually stop the\n    night-mare, hence it was called a hag-stone, as it prevents the\n    troublesome witches from sitting upon the sleeper's stomach. The same\n    amulet, tied to the key of the stable door, deterred witches from\n    riding horses over the country.\"\n\nOur forefathers firmly believed in planetary influence on the minds and\nbodies of men, and no operation could be performed on any part of the body\nunless the planet, ruling that particular part, were propitious. Rider's\n_British Merlin_ for 1715, places the name of some part of the body--face,\nneck, arms, breast, etc., opposite the days of the month, indicating that\nthe influence of the planets on that day is favourable to that particular\npart or organ. An old proverb says:--\n\n    \"Friday hair, Sunday horn,\n    You'll go the devil afore Monday morn,\"\n\nshewing that these days were unlucky for clipping hair and cutting nails.\nThe _York Fabric Rolls_[9] tell us that Maundy Thursday, the day before\nGood Friday, was termed Shere Thursday, because \"in olde faders dayes the\npeople wold that day _sheer_ theyr heddes and clype theyr berdes and poll\ntheyr heedes and so make them honest ayenst Easter Day.\" The same\ninteresting volume[10] gives the following account of charming away\nfevers:--\n\n    \"1528. Bishopwilton. Isabel Mure presented. She took fier, and ij yong\n    women w{t} hirr, and went to a rynnyng water, and light a wypse of\n    straw and sett it on the water, and said thus, 'Benedicite, se ye what\n    I see. I se the fier burne, and water rynne and the gryse grew, and\n    see flew and nyght fevers and all unkowth evils flee, and all other,\n    God will,' and after theis wordes said xv Pater Noster, xv Ave Maria\n    and thre credes.\"\n\nThe following is a reproduction of a receipt for Yellow Jonus (Jaundice)\ncopied from an old book in my possession. \"A quart of whine (wine), a\npenoth of Barbary barck, a penoth of Tormorch (Turmerich), a haporth of\nflour of Brimstone for Jonous.\"\n\n\n\n\nOf Physicians and their Fees,\n\nWITH SOME PERSONAL REMINISCENCES.\n\nBY ANDREW JAMES SYMINGTON, F.R.S.N.A.\n\n\nIn the whole range of professional life, or in any section of the\ncommunity, there is no set of men so self-denying, sympathetic,\nphilanthropic, liable to be called at any hour, day or night, and so\nhard-worked, as medical practitioners. To begin with, there is first, a\nlong and expensive course of study, and, often, several years pass, before\na practice becomes even self-sustaining. Those at the head of the\nprofession attain to large incomes, and make their L20,000 a year. Noted\nspecialists, in particular, such as the late Dr. Mackenzie, get large\nfees; but the majority of the profession conscientiously perform their\nlaborious and kindly ministrations ungrudgingly and with moderate\nremuneration, which, in most cases, is certainly far short of their\ndeserts.\n\nThis state of matters has prevailed for many centuries, and, taking the\ndifferent value of money into account, notwithstanding the advance of\nmedical science, there is but little change in the scale of remuneration,\nwhether as to large fees paid by Royal or titled personages, fees by the\nmiddle classes, or by the rural or working population.\n\nIt has been well said, that \"the theory and practice of medicine is the\nnoblest and most difficult science in the world; and that there is no\nother art for the practice of which the most thorough education is so\nessential.\"\n\nWhittier observes:--\"It is the special vocation of the doctor to grow\nfamiliar with suffering--to look upon humanity disrobed of its pride and\nglory--robbed of all its fictitious ornaments--weak, hopeless, naked--and\nundergoing the last fearful metempsychosis, from its erect and god-like\nimage, the living temple of an enshrined divinity, to the loathsome clod\nand the inanimate dust! Of what ghastly secrets of moral and physical\ndisease is he the depository!\"\n\nSir Thomas Browne, in his \"Religio Medici,\" says:--\"Men, that look no\nfurther than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and\nquarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I, that have examined\nthe parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that fabrick hangs,\ndo wonder that we are not always so; and, considering the thousand doors\nthat lead to death, do thank my God that we can die but once.\"\n\nThis model physician, who said, \"I cannot go to cure the body of my\npatient, but I forget my profession and call unto God for his soul,\" in\nthe same work, finely says of charity:--\"Divinity hath wisely divided the\nact thereof into many branches, and hath taught us, in this narrow way,\nmany paths unto goodness; as many ways as we may do good, so many ways we\nmay be charitable. There are infirmities not only of the body, but of soul\nand fortunes, which do require the merciful hand of our abilities. I\ncannot contemn a man for ignorance, but behold him with as much pity as I\ndo Lazarus. It is no greater charity to clothe his body than apparel the\nnakedness of his soul.\"\n\nHis distinguished position, as a physician and an author, demands very\nspecial and reverential mention in these pages.\n\nSir Thomas Browne was born in London on the 19th of October, 1605. He died\nat Norwich on the 19th of October, 1682, having reached exactly the age of\nseventy-seven. His father was a wealthy merchant, of a good Cheshire\nfamily, but died when his more illustrious son was a boy, and his mother\nshortly afterwards married Sir Thomas Dutton. After travelling on the\nContinent, he settled as a practising physician at Shipley Hall, near\nHalifax, for a time, and then moved to Norwich, where the remaining\nforty-two years of his life were spent. His library contained vast stores\nof learned works on antiquities, languages, and the curiosities of\nerudition. He corresponded with the best men of his day, and was often\nable to assist them in their various investigations. His friend Evelyn,\nalluding to Browne's home, at Norwich, tells us \"His whole house and\ngarden being a paradise and cabinet of rarities, and that of the best\ncollections, especially medals, books, plants, and natural things.\" He was\nknighted by Charles II. in 1671.\n\nThroughout the troublous times of the Civil War, the Commonwealth, and the\nRestoration, he led a quiet studious life, issuing volume after volume\nfull of profound, penetrating, and far-reaching thought, set forth in\nstately, sonorous, and musical language, the perfect form or style of\nwhich, at times, is only equalled but not excelled by the best cadenced\nprose of Milton or Jeremy Taylor.\n\nHis \"Religio Medici,\" \"Hydrotaphia or Urn Burial,\" and \"The Garden of\nCyrus,\" have been my favourites for more than half a century. Of the\nlatter work, John Addington Symonds has finely and truly said, that \"the\nrarer qualities of Sir Thomas Browne's style (are) here displayed in rich\nmaturity and heavy-scented blossom. The opening phrase of his dedication\nto Sir Thomas Le Gros--'When the funeral pyre was out, and the last\nvalediction over, men took a lasting adieu of their interred friends,\nlittle expecting the curiosity of future ages should comment on their\nashes;'--this phrase strikes a key-note to the sombre harmonies which\nfollow, connecting the ossuaries of the dead, the tears quenched in the\ndust of countless generations, with the vivid sympathy and scrutinizing\nsagacity of the living writer.... I will only call attention to the unique\nfeeling for verbal tone, for what may be called the musical colour of\nwords, for crumbling cadences, and the reverberation of stationary sounds\nin cavernous recesses, which is discernable at large throughout the\ndissertation. How simple, for example, seems the collocation of vocables\nin this phrase--'Under the drums and tramplings of three conquests!' And\nyet with what impeccable instinct the vowels are arranged; how naturally,\nhow artfully, the rhythm falls! Take another, and this time a complete\nsentence,--'But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and\ndeals with the memory of men, without distinction to merit of perpetuity.'\nTake yet another--'The brother of death daily haunts us with dying\nmementoes.'\"\n\nI take leave of this, the most notable of English Physicians, by\ntranscribing the following grand, suggestive, and characteristic passage\nfrom his \"Fragment on Mummies\":--\"Yet in these huge structures and\npyramidial immensities of the builders, whereof so little is known, they\nseemed not so much to raise sepulchres or temples to death, as to contemn\nand disdain it, astonishing heaven with their audacities, and looking\nforward with delight to their interment in those eternal piles. Of their\nliving habitations they made little account, conceiving of them but as\n_hospitia_, or inns, while they adorned the sepulchres of the dead, and\nplanting them on lasting basis, defied the crumbling touches of time and\nthe misty vaporousness of oblivion. Yet all were but Babel vanities. Time\nsadly overcometh all things, and is now dominant, and sitteth upon a\nsphinx, and looketh unto Memphis and old Thebes, while his sister Oblivion\nreclineth semisomnous on a pyramid, gloriously triumphing, making puzzles\nof Titanian erections, and turning old glories into dreams. History\nsinketh beneath her cloud. The traveller, as he paceth amazedly through\nthose deserts, asketh of her, who builded them? and she mumbleth\nsomething, but what it is he heareth not.\"\n\nThe medical profession is a noble and pleasant one, though laborious and\noften full of anxiety, straining mind and body. The good physician is the\nsympathizing, confidential, and comforting _friend_ of the family. He\nvalues the humble gifts and testimonials of gratitude from the poor, even\nmore than the costly presents of the rich.\n\nThe virtuous poor are always grateful. It can truly be said of the\nphysician's kind and often gratuitous services to them, in the language of\nscripture:--\n\n    \"When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me it\n    gave witness to me; because I delivered the poor that cried, and the\n    fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him\n    that was ready to perish came upon me; and I caused the widow's heart\n    to sing for joy.\"\n\nAmong savages, sorcerers, and magicians, are the medicine men; these are\nstill represented, in civilisation, by impostors and quacks. Members of\nthe profession, as a rule, keep themselves posted up in the medical\nscience of the day, honestly and unselfishly do everything that can be\ndone for their patients, and rejoice in being the means of their recovery,\nfar more than in their fee.\n\nBurton, in his \"Anatomy of Melancholy,\" treating of \"Physician, Patient,\nand Physick,\" when astrology, ignorance, and queer nostrums, were then\nmore in vogue than practical science, says:--\"I would require Honesty in\nevery Physician, that he be not over careless or covetous, Harpylike to\nmake a prey of his patient, or, as an hungry Chirurgeon, often produce and\nwire-draw his cure, so long as there is any hope of pay. Many of them, to\nget a fee, will give physic to every one that comes, when there is no\ncause, thus, as it often falleth out, stirring up a silent disease, and\nmaking a strong body weak.\" Burton then quotes the following sensible\nAphorism from Arnoldus:--\"A wise physician will not give physick, but\nupon necessity, and first try medicinal diet, before he proceedeth to\nmedicinal cure.\"\n\nLatimer thus severely censured the mercenary physicians of his day:--\"Ye\nsee by the example of Hezekiah that it is lawful to use physick. But now\nin our days physick is a remedy prepared only for rich folks, and not for\nthe poor, for the poor man is not able to wage the Physician. God indeed\nhath made physick for rich and poor, but Physicians in our time seek only\ntheir own profits, how to get money, not how they might do good unto their\npoor neighbour. Whereby it appeareth that they be for the most part\nwithout charity, and so consequently not the children of God; and no doubt\nbut the heavy judgment of God hangeth over their heads, for they are\ncommonly very wealthy, and ready to purchase lands, but to help their\nneighbour, that they cannot do. But God will find them out one day I doubt\nnot.\"\n\n\"Empirics and charlatans are the excrescences of the medical profession;\nthey have obtained in all ages, yet the healing art is not necessarily the\noccasion for deception; nor the operations of witchcraft, charms, amulets,\nastrology, alchemy, necromancy, or magic; although it has its mysteries\nlike other branches of occult science.\"\n\nParacelsus, the prince of charlatans, styled himself \"King of Physic,\"\nbut, though he professed to have discovered the _elixir of life_, he\nhumbly died at the early age of forty-eight years.\n\nWe are told of a patient who, instead of the medicine prescribed,\nswallowed the prescription! and _Punch_ records an extraordinary case of a\nvoracious individual who bolted a door, and threw up a window!\n\nSydney Smith, on being told by his doctor to take a walk on an empty\nstomach, asked--\"Upon whose!\" But a truce to stories suggested by the\nqueer nostrums of quacks.\n\nEmpirics, however, often believed in their nostrums, and were, sometimes,\namiable and unselfish.\n\nIn the year 1776, we are told, there lived a German doctor, who styled\nhimself, or was called, \"the Rain-water doctor;\" all the diseases to which\nflesh is heir he professed to cure by this simple agent. Some wonderful\ncures were, it is said, achieved by means of his application of this\nfluid, and his reputation spread far and wide; crowds of maimed and\nsickly folk flocked to him, seeking relief at his hands. What is yet more\nremarkable still, he declined to accept any fee from his patients!\n\nDr. Haygarth, of Bath, had a pair of wooden tractors made in precisely the\nsame shape and appearance as Perkin's metallic ones; and the same results\nfollowed as when the others, which cost five guineas a pair, were used.\n\nThe story is well known of the condemned criminal in Paris, who was laid\non a dissecting table, strapped down, with his eyes bandaged, and slightly\npricked, when streamlets of water set a-trickling made him think, as he\nhad been told, that he was being bled to death. His strength gradually\nebbed away, and he actually died, although he did not lose a drop of\nblood.\n\nI knew of a gentleman who, when pills to procure sleep were ordered to be\ndiscontinued, lay awake. The doctor made up a box of bread pills, which\nwere administered as the others had been, and the patient slept, and\nrecovered rapidly.\n\nA young medical man fell in love with a young lady patient, and, when he\nhad no longer any pretext for continuing his visits, he sent her a present\nof a pair of spring ducks. Not reciprocating his attentions, she did not\nacknowledge the present, upon which he ventured to call, asking if the\nbirds had reached her. Her reply was--\"Quack, quack!\"\n\nDr. Lettsom, a quaker in the time of George III., near the close of the\nlast century, had such an extensive practice that his receipts in some\nyears were as much as L12,000; and this although half his services were\nentirely gratuitous, and rendered with unusual solicitude and care to\nnecessitous clergymen and literary men. Generosity was the ruling feature\nof his life. On one occasion he attended an old American merchant whose\naffairs had gone wrong, and who grieved over leaving the trees he had\nplanted. The kind hearted doctor purchased the place from the creditors,\nand presented it to his patient for life.\n\nPope, a few days before his decease, bore the following cordial testimony\nto the urbanity and courtesy of his medical friends:--\"There is no end of\nmy kind treatment from the Faculty; they are in general the most amiable\ncompanions, and the best friends, as well as the most learned men I know.\"\n\nAnd Dryden, in the postscript to his translation of Virgil, speaks in the\nsame way of the profession. \"That I have recovered,\" says he, \"in some\nmeasure the health which I had lost by too much application to this work,\nis owing, next to God's mercy, to the skill and care of Dr. Guibbons and\nDr. Hobbs, the two ornaments of their profession, whom I can only pay by\nthis acknowledgment.\"\n\nWhen Dr. Dimsdale, a Hertford physician and member of Parliament, went\nover to Russia to inoculate the Empress Catherine and her son, in the year\n1768, he received a fee of L12,000, a pension for life of L500 per annum,\nand the rank of Baron of the Empire.\n\nDr. Henry Atkins was sent for to Scotland by James the Sixth to attend\nCharles the First (then an infant), ill of a dangerous fever. The King\ngave him a fee of L6000, with which he purchased the manor of Clapham.\n\nLouis XIV. after undergoing an operation, gave his physician and his\nsurgeon 75,000 crowns each.\n\nDr. Glynn once attended the only son of a poor peasant woman, ministering\nto his wants with port wine, bark, and delicacies. After the lad's\nrecovery, his mother waited on the doctor, bringing a large wicker basket\nwith an enormous magpie, which was her son's pet, as a fee to show their\ngratitude.\n\nA thousand pounds were ordered to be paid to Sir Edmund King for promptly\nbleeding Charles the Second, but he never received this fee.\n\nDr. Mead, in the time of George the First, was generous to a degree, and\nlike many of his brethren, would not accept fees from curates, half-pay\nofficers, and men of letters. At home his fee was a guinea. When he\nvisited patients of means, in consultation or otherwise, he expected two\nguineas or more. But to the apothecaries who waited on him at his coffee\nhouses of call he charged only half a guinea for prescriptions, written\nwithout his having seen the patient. He had an income one year of L7,000,\nand for several years received between L5,000 and L6,000, which,\nconsidering the value of money at that time, is as much as that of any\nliving physician.\n\nThe physicians who attended Queen Caroline had five hundred guineas, and\nthe surgeons three hundred guineas each; Dr. Willis was rewarded for his\nattendance on George III. by L1,500 per annum for twenty years, and L650\nper annum to his son for life. The other physicians, however, had only\nthirty guineas each visit to Windsor, and ten guineas each visit to Kew.\n\nDr. Abernethy was annoyed by a lady needlessly consulting him about her\ntongue. One morning she came, as he was descending the steps from his door\nand putting on his gloves. She said:--\"Doctor, I'm so glad I have caught\nyou!\" The doctor asked if it were the old trouble. On her saying \"Yes,\" he\ntold her to put out her tongue. She did so, and he said, \"Stand there till\nI come,\" and left her so, in the street, setting out on his round of\nvisits.\n\nOnce when prescribing nutritious and expensive diet for a young man in\nconsumption, he observed the look of despair on the young wife's face, and\nthe evidence of straitened circumstances around; when the lady appealed to\nhim, asking if there was really nothing else he could suggest for her\nhusband. He replied:--\"When I think of it, I'll send along a box of pills\nin the afternoon!\" A messenger brought the box. On the lid was written\n\"One every day,\" and, on being opened, it was found to contain twenty\nguineas!\n\nHe once bluntly told a _bon-vivant_ gentleman to \"Live on sixpence a day,\nand earn it!\"\n\nLong ago, a friend told me of a lady in Devonshire, belonging to a family\nshe knew, who read medical books, and at length imagined she had every\ndisease under the sun. Whenever she discovered what she believed to be a\nnew symptom, she at once went off to consult different medical men\nregarding it, spending several hundreds a year in this way, and all quite\nneedlessly. At length she confided to her friends that since doctors\ndiffered so widely, and she could obtain no satisfaction as to what ailed\nher, she had resolved to go to town and consult one of the Queen's\nphysicians.\n\nA consultation was held in the family, and her nephew was sent to explain\nmatters to the physician, in the hope of his being able to cure her\nhypochondria. When she reached town, the street in which the physician\nlived was blocked with the carriages of patients. After waiting hours, her\nturn at last came. The physician examined her, asked a few questions, then\nenquired if she had any friends in town, as he would rather call to see\nher when under their roof, and there tell her what he had got to say. She\nprotested that she was quite prepared to hear the worst--that she had for\nlong years looked death in the face--that the notices of her death were\nlying in her desk, all written out and addressed, only requiring the date\nto be filled in, etc. The physician said he was busy--more than twenty\npatients were still waiting in the street--he was averse to scenes, and\nwould much prefer to see her at her friend's house. She still persisted,\nand begged of him to tell her all, there and then, on which he\nsaid:--\"Madam, it is my melancholy duty to inform you--that there is\nnothing whatever the matter with you!\"\n\nThis interview fortunately effected her cure, to the great delight of her\nfriends, who paid the physician a handsome fee.\n\nSir Astley Cooper one year received in fees L21,000. This sum was\nexceptional, but for many years his income was over L15,000. His great\nsuccess was achieved very gradually. \"His earnings for the first nine\nyears of his professional career progressed thus:--In the first year he\nnetted five guineas; in the second, twenty-six pounds; in the third,\nsixty-four pounds; in the fourth, ninety-six pounds; in the fifth, a\nhundred pounds; in the sixth, two hundred pounds; in the seventh, four\nhundred pounds; in the eighth, six hundred and ten pounds; and in the\nninth--the year in which he secured his hospital appointment--eleven\nhundred pounds.\"\n\nOn one occasion when he had performed a perilous surgical operation on a\nrich West Indian merchant, the two physicians who were present were paid\nthree hundred guineas each; but the patient, addressing Sir Astley,\nsaid:--\"But you, sir, shall have something better. There, sir, take\n_that_,\" upon which he flung his nightcap at the skilful operator. \"Sir,\"\nreplied Sir Astley, picking up the cap, \"I'll pocket the affront.\" On\nreaching home, he found in the cap a draft for a thousand guineas from the\ngrateful but eccentric old man.\n\nA cynical lawyer once advised a young doctor to collect his fees as he\nwent along, quoting the following verse to back his recommendation:--\n\n    \"God and the doctor we alike adore,\n    But only when in danger, not before;\n    The danger o'er, both are alike requited--\n    God is forgotten, and the doctor slighted.\"\n\nThe following story illustrates the too frequent weary waiting, when hope\nmakes the heart sick, and also shows on what curious casual incidents the\nsuccess of a career may sometimes turn. It has been told in different\nways, and attributed to different men, such as to Dr. Freind, and others;\nbut, quite possibly, the same or a similar incident may have repeatedly\noccurred. I simply give it as it was narrated to me. A young doctor having\ngraduated with honours, took a house at a high rent in Harley Street,\nLondon. The brass plate attracted no patients; months passed idly and\ndrearily, and the poor fellow took to drink. One night the door-bell\nrang--a servant man, from a lady of title round the corner, begged him to\ncome at once, as his mistress was dangerously ill, lying on the floor; her\nown doctor was out, and he was sent to fetch the first doctor he could\nfind. The young doctor regretfully thought what a fool he was, for here\nwas his chance, when he could not avail himself of it; but he would go,\nand try hard to pull himself together.\n\nWhen he reached the room, he had enough conscience or sense left to know\nthat he was not in a fit state to prescribe, and exclaiming, \"Drunk, by\nGeorge!\" took his hat and bolted from the house. Next morning he received\na scented note from the lady, entreating him not to expose her, inviting\nhim to call, and offering to introduce him professionally to her circle!\nBefore the season was ended, his practice was yielding him at the rate of\nsome L1500 a year!\n\nCuriously enough, it is recorded of a British doctor that he once actually\ntook a fee from a _dead_ patient. Entering the bedroom immediately after\ndeath had taken place, he observed the right hand tightly clenched.\nOpening the fingers, he found in them a guinea. \"Ah, that was clearly for\nme,\" said the doctor, putting the gold into his pocket.\n\nIt may be remembered here, that the Royal College of Physicians, London,\nwas founded by Thomas Linacre, physician to Henry VIII., in 1518; and that\nthe Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh was incorporated by Charter\nof Charles II., November 20th, 1681.\n\nAs to the fees paid to physicians, we find that Dr. Edward Browne, the son\nof Sir Thomas Browne, who became a distinguished physician in London, in\nhis Journal, under the date of February 16th, 1664, records: \"I went to\nvisit Mr. Edward Ward, an old man in a feaver, when Mrs. Anne Ward gave me\nmy first fee, 10 shillings.\"\n\nIn a work entitled \"Levamen Infirmi,\" published in the year 1700, we find\nthat the scale of remuneration to surgeons and physicians was as\nfollows:--\"To a graduate in physic, his due is about ten shillings, though\nhe commonly expects or demands twenty. Those that are only licenced\nphysicians, their due is no more than six shillings and eightpence, though\nthey commonly demand ten shillings. A surgeon's fee is twelvepence a mile,\nbe his journey far or near; ten groats to set a bone broke or out of\njoint; and for letting blood one shilling; the cutting off or amputation\nof any limb is five pounds, but there is no settled price for the cure.\"\n\nTill recent times neither barristers nor physicians could recover their\nfees by legal proceedings against their clients or patients unless a\nspecial contract had been made. In the case of lawyers this custom can be\ntraced back to the days of ancient Rome. Their services were regarded as\nbeing gratuitously rendered in the interests of friendship and justice,\nand of a value no money could buy. The acknowledgment given them by\nclients was regarded as an _honorarium_, and paid in advance, so that all\npecuniary interest in the issue of the suit was removed, thus preserving\nthe independence and respectability of the bar.\n\nEquity draftsmen, conveyancers, and such like, however, could recover\nreasonable charges for work done.\n\nSo in the medical profession, surgeons, dentists, cuppers, and the like\nwere always entitled to sue for their fees; but the valuable services of a\nconsulting physician were of a different kind, not rendered for payment\nbut acknowledged by the gratitude and honour of his patients.\n\nBut this code of honour was modified when all medical practitioners were\nrelieved by the Act of 21 and 22 Vict. 90, which applied to the United\nKingdom, and enabled them to recover in any court of law their reasonable\ncharges as well as costs of medicines and medical appliances used. This\nrule applies to physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries as defined by the\nstatute.\n\nThe following information is taken from \"Everybody's Pocket Cyclopaedia\"\n(Saxon & Co.).\n\n\nLONDON MEDICAL FEES.\n\n\"Patients are charged according to their supposed income, the income being\nindicated by the rental of the house in which they reside. The following\nare the charges usually made by medical practitioners:--\n\n    -----------------------------------------------------------------------\n                          |                    Rentals.\n                          |------------------------------------------------\n                          |    L10 to L25  |    L25 to L50  |  L50 to L100\n    ----------------------|----------------|----------------|--------------\n    Ordinary Visit        | 2s 6d to 3s 6d |   3s 6d to 5s  |  5s to 7s 6d\n    Night Visit           |   Double an    |    Ordinary    |     Visit\n    Mileage beyond two    |                |                |\n      miles from home     |      1s 6d     |       2s       |     2s 6d\n    Detention per hour    | 2s 6d to 3s 6d |   3s 6d to 5s  |  5s to 7s 6d\n    Letters of Advice     | Same charge as |    for an Or-  | dinary Visit\n    Attendance on Servants|      2s 6d     | 2s 6d to 3s 6d |  3s 6d to 5s\n    Midwifery             |       21s      |    21s to 30s  |  42s to 105s\n                          |                |                |\n    CONSULTANTS.          |                |                |\n                          |                |                |\n    Advice or visit alone |       21s      |       21s      |     21s\n    Advice or visit with  |                |                |\n      another Practitioner|       21s      |    21s to 42s  |  21s to 42s\n    Mileage beyond two    |                |                |\n      miles from home     |      10s 6d    |      10s 6d    |    10s 6d\n    -----------------------------------------------------------------------\n\n\"Special visits, _i.e._, of which due notice has not been given before the\npractitioner starts on his daily round, are charged at the rate of a visit\nand a half. Patients calling on the doctor are charged at the same rate as\nif visited by him.\n\n\"There are about 23,000 physicians and surgeons in the United Kingdom, or\none to every 1,600 inhabitants.\"\n\nIt has been my privilege to know several doctors intimately. Our family\ndoctor when I was a boy in Paisley, was Dr. Kerr, a man far in advance of\nhis day. He was the means of introducing a pure water supply to the town\nof Paisley, always strenuously urging the importance of sanitary matters\nand good drainage, when such things were then but little understood, and\ngreatly neglected. Shortly after the water had been introduced to the\nhouses, from Stanley, an old man--who had been accustomed to purchase\nwater from a cart which went through the streets selling it from a\nbarrel--on being asked how he liked the new water, replied indignantly,\n\"Wha's going to pay good siller for water that has neither smell nor\ntaste?\"\n\nOn one occasion, an elderly gentleman, who was slightly hypochondriac,\nconsulted Dr. Kerr about his clothing, saying that he regulated the\nthickness of his flannels by the thermometer. Dr. Kerr, losing patience,\nsaid, \"Can you not use the thermometer your Maker has put in your inside,\nand put on clothes when you are cold?\"\n\nDr. Kerr's son and assistant, whom we then called \"the young doctor,\" died\na few years ago in Canada, over eighty years of age. No man could\npossibly have been more considerately kind, gentle, and tender-hearted. On\none occasion, in 1841, when, in typhus fever, I was struggling for my\nlife, he sat up with me for three whole consecutive nights, and brought me\nthrough. He ever kept himself abreast of the science of the day, and\ndevoted his abilities and energies, _con amore_, to the benefitting of\nmen's souls as well as their bodies.\n\nAnother model village and country doctor, also an intimate friend of my\nparents, Dr. Campbell of Largs, I knew very well. Good, genial, and\naccomplished, he was a perfect gentleman, and equally at home dining with\nSir Thomas Brisbane, or drinking a cup of tea at some old woman's kitchen\nfireside. He read the _Lancet_, and tried all new medicines, and\nrepeatedly, when going to London, at his request I procured the most\nrecent instruments for him. He was intimate with Dr. Chalmers, Lord\nJeffrey, Lord Moncrieff, Lord Cardwell, etc. In telling me of experiments\nwith Perkin's metallic tractors, and that the same results were obtained\nwith wooden ones, showing the power of imagination, he gave me a recent\ncurious illustration. He had lately had the old fashioned little panes of\nglass taken out of the windows of his house, and plate glass inserted.\nHis mother, who did not know of the change, calling one afternoon, sat on\nan easy chair, close by the gable window, knitting. On suddenly looking\nround she said, \"Oh John, I've been sitting all this time by an _open_\nwindow,\" and forthwith she began to sneeze! She actually took cold, and\neven afterwards could scarcely be persuaded that it had _not_ been an open\nwindow, for she said she felt the cold! The doctor told me of an old\nmaiden lady who consulted him, and who, when he prescribed in a general\nway, insisted on knowing exactly what ailed her. He said she was only\nslightly nervous, and would soon be all right. This did not at all please\nher, and she at once loudly protested--\"Me nervous! There is not a nerve\nin my whole body!\"\n\nA West India merchant, one of his patients whom I knew, he also told me,\none day said to him, \"Doctor, for forty years I never knew I had a\nstomach, and now I can think of nothing else!\"\n\nAt the cholera time Dr. Campbell was laid down by the disease. The fact\nspread like wildfire over the village, and, at once, prayer-meetings for\nhis recovery were called by the public bellman, meetings of _all_ the\ndifferent denominations, including the Roman Catholics (Dr. Campbell was a\nFree Church Elder), and there were truly heartfelt rejoicings in the whole\ndistrict over his recovery.\n\nI once asked him how he managed to get in his fees, since he never refused\nto visit when sent for. He said that one year, from curiosity, he kept an\naccount of his gratuitous visits, and it ran into three figures; but he\nnever took the trouble to note them again, as it served no purpose.\n\nMany years ago he went to his rest, and, at his request, during his last\nillness, I paid him a farewell visit.\n\nThere are few finer descriptions of the country doctor than that contained\nin Ian Maclaren's \"Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush,\" a book which speaks\ndirectly home to every true Scottish heart.\n\nDr. Campbell, in his large-hearted and genial Christian charity,\nscientific research, and philosophical acquirements, always reminded me of\nSir Thomas Browne, \"the beloved physician\" of Norwich.\n\nThe following pleasing incident, relating to a medical man, came under my\nown notice. I often visited a country minister, an intimate friend, a\nlearned man, and a genius, the quaint originality of whose observations\noften reminded me of Fuller, the Church historian, or Charles Lamb.\nAlthough of limited means, the Rev. Robert Winning, of Eaglesham, was ever\nhospitable; if he knew of any poor student, he would invite him to the\nmanse for a month, on the plea that he would help to prepare him for his\nexamination in Hebrew and Greek. The old manse servant, also an original,\nwas paid a sum of money as compensation for refusing tips from visitors.\nOne day, seeing an advertisement of a new book in a magazine I was\nreading, Mr. Winning remarked to me, \"Andrew, I wish you would buy that\nbook, _cut the leaves_, and lend it to me to read!\"\n\nOne evening a message reached him from the village inn, saying that a\ndoctor had come to an urgent case, which required him to stay over night,\nthat there was no room in the inn, and asking if the minister could give\nhim a bed. His wife, knowing the house was full, asked her husband what\nthey should do. His reply was, \"Be not forgetful to entertain strangers,\nfor thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Give him a room,\nthough we have to sleep on the floor.\" He was accordingly hospitably\nentertained.\n\nSome time after, the minister took ill. The medical guest heard of it,\nwent to see the local doctor, and, with his consent, visited the minister\ntwice a week, from a distance of nine miles, and for a period of some four\nmonths, till his death. When the widow afterwards sent for his account, he\nsaid there was none, for it had been more than discharged on the first\nevening he had spent at the manse.\n\nDr. Stark, of Glasgow, who attended my family for years, was a skilful\npractitioner, but eccentric. He generally made light of trifling ailments,\nbut was most energetic when aroused by any appearance of danger. I knew of\nhis being suddenly called in to see an old lady who was far gone in an\nadvanced stage of cholera. He at once asked to be shown over the house,\nlooked at the different fireplaces, but as none of them suited his\npurpose, he went to the kitchen, threw off his coat, took out the range,\nmade a fire in the recess that would have roasted an ox, had the old lady\ncarried down in blankets and placed before it, worked energetically with\nher the whole night, and brought her through. In a similar way he once\nstayed over night and saved the life of one of my boys. One day I called\nat his house, and, finding him with a bad cold, eyes red and watery,\nthroat husky, said, \"Doctor, if you found me so, you would prescribe\nplacing the feet in hot water and mustard, warm gruel, medicine, and going\nto bed! Physician, heal thyself!\" The doctor's Shakespearian reply was,\n\"Do you think I am such a fool as to take physic?\"\n\nOnce when accompanying me to the coast to visit one of my children, there\nwas a heavy sea on, and the steamer, on approaching the pier, rolled\nalarmingly, and was close on a lee shore. A strange lady on board, in\nterror, laid hold of the doctor, a tall, stalwart man, saying, \"Oh! sir,\nare we going to the bottom?\" On which he said, dryly, \"Behave yourself, if\nyou are going there, you are going in good company!\" which odd answer\nreassured and caused her to laugh.\n\nIn speaking of a Greek gem representing Cupid and Pysche, one day, when\ndriving in Wigtonshire with the late Dr. David Easton, a medical friend,\nhe said I had not given the correct pronunciation of the names. Always\nwilling to learn, I asked to be put right; whereupon, the doctor gravely\ninformed me that I ought to have said--Cupped and Physic!\n\nI have spoken of the kindness of medical men, such as Dr. Garth Wilkinson,\nto clergymen, artists, and literary men. I add one more expression of\ngratitude, which is a good modern instance:--\n\nWhen at St. Helens, in Jersey, during his last illness, my friend Samuel\nLover, the genial poet and artist, wrote the following lines to Dr. Dixon,\nhis friend and physician. I first copied them some years ago from Lover's\nMS. note-book, kindly lent me by his widow when I was engaged in the\npreparation of his life. Such cordial tributes are a good physician's most\nhighly-valued fees:--\n\n    \"Whene'er your vitality\n    Is feeble in quality,\n    And you fear a fatality\n        May end the strife,\n    Then Dr. Joe Dickson\n    Is the man I would fix on\n    For putting new wicks on\n        The lamp of life.\"\n\nFrom the many varied facts and incidents adduced in these pages, it will\nbe seen that, in anxiety or sorrow, the good family doctor is a true and\nsympathetic friend, whose services can never be paid by gold.\n\nNext to religion, nothing is more precious or comforting than the sympathy\nof those who know and fully understand our sufferings, for, as my old\nfavourite, Sir Thomas Browne, to whom I ever revert with renewed pleasure,\ntruly and beautifully says:--\"It is not the tears of our own eyes only,\nbut of our friends also, that do exhaust the current of our sorrows,\nwhich, falling into many streams, runs more peaceably, and is contented\nwith a narrower channel.\"\n\n\nYe Ende\n\n\n\n\nIndex.\n\n\n  Abernethy, John, 206-208, 266\n\n  Advertisements, Curious, 155-159\n\n  Ague, Charms for, 240-241\n\n  Akenside, Mark, 109-111\n\n  Andrews, William, Barber-Surgeons, 1-7;\n    Touching for King's Evil, 8-23;\n    Assaying Meat and Drink, 24-31\n\n  Anne, Queen, 18-19\n\n  Assay Cups, 30-31\n\n  Assaying Meat and Drink, 24-31\n\n  Atkins, Dr. H., 264\n\n  Axon, W. E. A., The Doctor in the time of Pestilence, 125-139\n\n\n  Banks, Mrs. G. Linnaeus, Some Old Doctors, 192-208\n\n  Barber-Surgeons, 1-7\n\n  Barber's Pole, 6, 35\n\n  Bicycle, 23\n\n  Birmingham town's book, 15\n\n  Bisley, 15\n\n  Bishop, hanged, 167\n\n  Bishop and Williams, body-snatchers, 171-177\n\n  Blackmore, R. D., 118\n\n  Blackmore, Dr., 111-113\n\n  Black Art, 45\n\n  Bleeding, 7, 216\n\n  Blood, Circulation of the, 195\n\n  Blood in windows, 2\n\n  Boke of Jhon Caius, 127\n\n  Booker, Rev. Dr., on small-pox, 163-164\n\n  Bossy, a quack, 149\n\n  Brown, Dr. John, 115\n\n  Brown, Sir Thomas, 123, 124, 253-258, 278, 283\n\n  Bruce, King Robert the, 209\n\n  Buddhism, 67-68\n\n  Bulleyn, Dr., quoted, 219\n\n  Burke and Hare, 168\n\n  Burkers and Body-Snatchers, 167-180\n\n  Burning for disease, 46\n\n  Burton's \"Anatomy of Melancholy,\" 259-260\n\n  Byron quoted, 187\n\n\n  Campbell, Dr., 276, 278\n\n  Cancer, Curious treatment for, 222\n\n  Carriages, 22-23\n\n  Celestials and medicine, 58-61\n\n  Chalmers, John, M.D., 115\n\n  Charms, 43-44, 52\n\n  Chaucer's Doctor of Physic, 70-75\n\n  Chester in plague time, 133-135;\n    Touching at, 17\n\n  Cholera, Reminiscences of, 181-191\n\n  Circulation of the blood, 195\n\n  Colic, Charm for, 248\n\n  Cooper, Sir Astley, 170, 179, 268\n\n  Coryat, 141\n\n  Cramp, Charm, 52;\n    Strange cure for, 249\n\n  Croydon, Cholera at, 185-186, 190\n\n  Crusade, 209\n\n  Cumming, Dr. W. F., 114-115\n\n  Cupping, 217\n\n  Curious prescriptions, 226\n\n\n  Dickens, Charles, Satires by, 65-66\n\n  Dickens' Doctors, 90-101\n\n  Dimsdale, Dr., 264\n\n  Disinfectants in sticks, 33\n\n  Disputes between surgeons and barbers, 5\n\n  Doctor in the time of Pestilence, 125-139\n\n  Doctors Shakespeare Knew, 76-89\n\n  Dog bites, 242\n\n  Douglas, Sir James, 209\n\n  Doyle, Dr. Conan, 118\n\n  \"Drunk by George,\" 270\n\n\n  Ecclesfield, 16\n\n  Edward the Confessor, 8-9\n\n  Egyptians and Magic, 57-58\n\n  Elizabeth, Queen, at dinner, 28-29\n\n  Erysipelas, 243\n\n  Eskimo Medicine Men, 61-63\n\n\n  Faith Cures, 42\n\n  Famous Literary Doctors, 102-124\n\n  Fees, London, 273-274\n\n  Food taken in fear, 24\n\n  Freind, John, 196\n\n  Frost, Thomas, Dickens' Doctors, 90-101.\n    Mountebanks and Medicine, 140-152.\n    The Strange Fight with the Small-pox, 153-166.\n    Burkers and Body-Snatchers, 167-180.\n    Reminiscences of the Cholera, 181-191\n\n\n  Galen, 120\n\n  Gallows, superstitions respecting, 249\n\n  Gild, Barbers', 2\n\n  Gold-headed Cane, 32-41\n\n  Grave-mould, 45\n\n  Greatrake, Valentine, 82\n\n  Great Plague of London, 136-139\n\n\n  Hall, Dr., 88-89\n\n  Harvey, Wm., 194-196\n\n  Heart of Bruce, 210\n\n  Hentzner in England, 28\n\n  Hill, Sir John, 114\n\n  Hodges, Dr., 137\n\n  Holbein, Picture by, 3\n\n  Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 106-108\n\n  How our Fathers were Physicked, 216-233\n\n  Hunter, John, 198\n\n  Hunter, William, 199\n\n  Hunterian Museum, 205\n\n\n  Jaundice, 251\n\n  Jenner, 159-162\n\n  Johnston, Arthur, 122-123\n\n  Johnson, Dr., touched for the evil, 18-19\n\n\n  Kerr, Dr., 275\n\n\n  Langford, J. A., LL.D., How our Fathers were Physicked, 216\n\n  Latimer on Mercenary Physicians, 260\n\n  Lee Penny, 209-215\n\n  Lettsom, J. C., 35, 263\n\n  Liver, eating human, 51\n\n  Lockhart, Sir Simon, 211-213\n\n  Lotteries, 151\n\n  Lover, Samuel, 282\n\n\n  Macbeth, quoted, 9\n\n  Mashonaland, Credulity in, 63-65\n\n  Magic and Medicine, 42-69\n\n  Manchester in plague time, 135-136\n\n  Mead, Dr., 265\n\n  Medical Folk Lore, 234-251\n\n  Medical Students, 97-98\n\n  Merry Andrew, 141-151\n\n  Mercenary Physicians, 260\n\n  Metals and precious stones used, 218\n\n  Mountebanks and Medicine, 140-152\n\n  Mouse, roasted, prescribed, 221\n\n  Moir, D. M., 116-118\n\n  Montagu, Lady May, 153-154, 162\n\n  Monks as surgeons, 1;\n    forbidden to bleed, 2\n\n\n  Newcastle-on-Tyne, Siege of, 213\n\n  Nicholson, John, Medical Folk-Lore, 234-251\n\n  North American Indian medicine men, 52-56\n\n\n  O'Brien, Giant, 202\n\n  Of Physicians and their Fees, 252-283\n\n\n  Parliament, Folly of, 223\n\n  Phillips, John, 111\n\n  Pilgrim's Staff, 32\n\n  Planetary Influence, 250\n\n  Plantagenent kings touching for the evil, 10\n\n  Pontefract Castle, 27\n\n  Pole, Barber's, 6\n\n  Preston records, 17\n\n\n  Radcliffe's cane, 33\n\n  Rain-water doctor, 261\n\n  Reminiscences of the Cholera, 181-191\n\n  Revolting prescriptions, 225\n\n  Richardson, Sir B. W., 202, 204\n\n  Rings from hinges of coffins, 249\n\n  Robinson, Tom, M.D., The Gold-headed Cane, 32-41\n\n  Rochester, Earl of, 144\n\n  Rheumatism, 238\n\n\n  Sacrificing for disease, 47-49\n\n  Skull, Human, Medical uses, 227\n\n  Small-pox, Old receipt for, 72\n\n  Smith, Sydney, Witty remark, 261\n\n  Some Old Doctors, 192-208\n\n  St. Agnes' Eve, 241\n\n  Stark, Dr., 280-281\n\n  Statute of Labourers, 124-125\n\n  Strange Stories, 262\n\n  Strange Story of the Fight with the Small Pox, 153-166\n\n  Stuart kings touching for the evil, 12-14\n\n  Suicide's skull, Drinking from, 50\n\n  Symington, A. J., Of Physicians and their Fees, 252-283\n\n\n  Tooth-drawing, 5\n\n  Thompson, W. H., Chaucer's Doctor of Physic, 70-75\n\n  Thurlow, Lord, on Barbers and Surgeons, 6\n\n  Thompson, Sir Henry, 115\n\n  Tobacco, Poet's Praise of, 111\n\n  Tournament, 186\n\n  Toothache, Folk-lore of, 235-237, 249\n\n  Toad, 227\n\n  Touching for the King's Evil, 8-23\n\n  Touch-pieces, 11, 20-21\n\n  Terling, Essex, 15\n\n  Tudor Kings touching for the Evil, 11\n\n\n  Verney Family, 229-233\n\n  Visiting Patients, 22-23\n\n\n  Wall, A. H., Doctors Shakespeare Knew, 76-89\n\n  Walters, Cuming, Magic and Medicine, 42-69;\n    Famous Literary Doctors, 102-124\n\n  Warren, Samuel, 116\n\n  Warts, Charms for, 247\n\n  Whooping cough, 244-246\n\n  Wig, 35\n\n  William III. refuses to touch, 18\n\n  Winchester, Mountebank at, 147-148\n\n  Witchcraft, 49-50, 242\n\n\n  York records, 16-17\n\n\n  Zulu doctors, 65\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[1] \"Chester in the Plantagenet and Tudor Periods,\" by Rupert H. Morris,\n1894, pp. 78-79.\n\n[2] The _Asclepiad_, Vol. viii.\n\n[3] Act ii., sc. 2.\n\n[4] Dyer's English Folk Lore, p. 156.\n\n[5] Dyer's English Folk Lore, p. 158.\n\n[6] _Records of York Castle_, p. 230.\n\n[7] Folk Lore Journal, v. 5.\n\n[8] Vol. i., p. 761.\n\n[9] P. 353.\n\n[10] P. 273.\n\n\n\n\nTranscriber's Notes:\n\nPassages in italics are indicated by _italics_.\n\nSuperscripted characters are indicated by {superscript}.\n\nThe original text contains letters with diacritical marks that are not\nrepresented in this text version.","title":"The Doctor in History, Literature, Folk-Lore, Etc.","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":56484}