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diff --git a/39514.txt b/39514.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bda1a4f --- /dev/null +++ b/39514.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6416 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Doctor in History, Literature, +Folk-Lore, Etc., ed. by William Andrews + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Doctor in History, Literature, Folk-Lore, Etc. + +Author: Various + +Editor: William Andrews + +Release Date: April 23, 2012 [EBook #39514] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DOCTOR IN HISTORY *** + + + + +Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive.) + + + + + + + + + +THE DOCTOR. + + + + +[Illustration: HENRY VIII. RECEIVING THE BARBER-SURGEONS.] + + + + + THE DOCTOR IN HISTORY, + LITERATURE, FOLK-LORE, ETC. + + + EDITED BY + WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S., + AUTHOR OF "BYGONE ENGLAND," + "OLD CHURCH LORE," ETC. + + + HULL: + WILLIAM ANDREWS & CO., THE HULL PRESS. + LONDON: + SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, HAMILTON, KENT, & CO., LTD. + + 1896. + + + + +Preface. + + +In the following pages I have attempted to bring together from the pens of +several authors who have written expressly for this book, the more +interesting phases of the history, literature, folk-lore, etc., of the +medical profession. + +If the same welcome be given to this work as was accorded to those I have +previously produced, my labours will not have been in vain. + +WILLIAM ANDREWS. + + THE HULL PRESS, + HULL, _November 11th, 1895_. + + + + +Contents. + + + BARBER-SURGEONS. By William Andrews, F.R.H.S. 1 + + TOUCHING FOR THE KING'S EVIL. By William Andrews, F.R.H.S. 8 + + VISITING PATIENTS 22 + + ASSAYING MEAT AND DRINK. By William Andrews, F.R.H.S. 24 + + THE GOLD-HEADED CANE. By Tom Robinson, M.D. 32 + + MAGIC AND MEDICINE. By Cuming Walters 42 + + CHAUCER'S DOCTOR OF PHYSIC. By W. H. Thompson 70 + + THE DOCTORS SHAKESPEARE KNEW. By A. H. Wall 76 + + DICKENS' DOCTORS. By Thomas Frost 90 + + FAMOUS LITERARY DOCTORS. By Cuming Walters 102 + + THE "DOCTOR" IN TIME OF PESTILENCE. By William E. A. + Axon, F.R.S.L. 125 + + MOUNTEBANKS AND MEDICINE. By Thomas Frost 140 + + THE STRANGE STORY OF THE FIGHT WITH THE SMALL-POX. + By Thomas Frost 153 + + BURKERS AND BODY-SNATCHERS. By Thomas Frost 167 + + REMINISCENCES OF THE CHOLERA. By Thomas Frost 181 + + SOME OLD DOCTORS. By Mrs. G. Linnaeus Banks 192 + + THE LEE PENNY 209 + + HOW OUR FATHERS WERE PHYSICKED. By J. A. Langford, LL.D. 216 + + MEDICAL FOLK-LORE. By John Nicholson 234 + + OF PHYSICIANS AND THEIR FEES, with some Personal + Reminiscences. By Andrew James Symington, F.R.S.N.A. 252 + + INDEX 285 + + + + +THE DOCTOR IN HISTORY, LITERATURE, AND FOLK-LORE. + + + + +Barber-Surgeons. + +BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S. + + +The calling of the barber is of great antiquity. We find in the Book of +the Prophet Ezekiel (v. 1) allusions to the Jewish custom of the barber +shaving the head as a sign of mourning. + +In the remote past the art of surgery and the trade of barber were +combined. It is clear that in all parts of the civilized world, in bygone +times, the barber acted as a kind of surgeon, or to state his position +more precisely, he practised phlebotomy. + +Barbers appear to have gained their experience from the monks whom they +assisted in surgical operations. The clergy up to about the twelfth +century had the care of men's bodies as well as of their souls, and +practised surgery and medicine. The operations of surgery involved the +shedding of blood, and it was felt that this was incompatible with the +functions of the clergy. After much consideration and discussion, in 1163 +the council of Tours, under Pope Alexander III., forbade the clergy to act +as surgeons, but they were permitted to dispense medicine. + +The edict of Tours must have given satisfaction to the barbers, and they +were not slow to avail themselves of the opportunities the change afforded +them. In London, and we presume in other places, the barbers advertised +their blood-letting in a most objectionable manner. It was customary to +put blood in their windows to attract the attention of the public. An +ordinance was passed in 1307, directing the barbers to have the blood +"privily carried into the Thames under pain of paying two shillings to the +use of the Sheriffs." + +At an early period in London the barbers were banded together, and a gild +was formed. In the first instance it seems that the chief object was the +bringing together of the members at religious observances. They attended +the funerals and obits of deceased members and their wives. Eventually it +was transformed into a semi-social and religious gild, and subsequently +became a trade gild. + +In 1308, Richard le Barber, the first master of the Barbers' Company, was +sworn at the Guildhall, London. As time progressed, the London Company of +Barbers increased in importance. + +In the first year of the reign of Edward IV. (1462) the barbers were +incorporated by a royal charter, and it was confirmed by succeeding +monarchs. + +A change of title occurred in 1540, and it was then named the Company of +Barber-Surgeons. Holbein painted a picture of Henry VIII. and the +Barber-Surgeons. The painting is still preserved, and may be seen at the +Barber-Surgeons' Hall, Monkwell Street, London. We give a carefully +executed wood engraving of the celebrated picture. Pepys calls this "not a +pleasant though a good picture." It is the largest and last painting of +Holbein. In the _Leisure Hour_ for September 1895, are some interesting +details respecting it, that are well worth reproducing. "It is painted," +we are told, "on vertical oak boards, being 5ft. 11in. high by 10ft. 2in. +long. It seems to have been begun about 1541, and finished after +Holbein's death in 1543, and it has evidently been altered since its first +delivery. The tablet, for instance, was not always in the background, for +the old engraving in the College of Surgeons has a window in its place, +showing the old tower of St. Bride's, and thus indicating Bridewell as the +site of the ceremony. The outermost figure to the left, too, is omitted, +and, according to some critics, the back row of heads are all +post-Holbeinic. The names over the heads appear to have been added in +Charles I.'s time, and it is significant that only two portraits in the +back row are so distinguished." The king is represented wearing his robes, +and is seated on a chair of state, holding erect his sword of state, and +about him are the leading members of the fraternity. "The men whose +portraits appear in the picture," says the _Leisure Hour_, "are not +nonentities. The first figure to the king's right, with his hands in his +gown, is Dr. John Chambre, king's physician, Fellow and Warden of Merton, +and happy in his multitudinous appointments, both clerical and lay. Behind +him is the Doctor Butts of Shakespeare's 'Henry VIII.'--the Sir William +Butts who was the king's and Princess Mary's physician, and whose wife is +known by Holbein's splendid portrait of her. Behind Butts is Alsop, the +king's apothecary. To the king's left the first figure is Thomas Vicary, +surgeon to Bartholomew's Hospital, serjeant-surgeon to the king, and +author of 'The Anatomie of the Bodie of Man.' Next to him is Sir John +Ayleff, an exceptionally good portrait. Then come in the undernamed: +Nicholas Simpson, Edmund Harman (one of the witnesses to the king's will), +James Monforde (who gave the company the silver hammer still used by the +Master in presiding at the courts), John Pen (another fine portrait), +Nicholas Alcocke, and Richard Ferris (also serjeant-surgeon to the king). +In the back row the only names given are those of Christopher Salmond and +William Tilley." + +In the reign of Henry VIII. an enactment as follows was in force:--"No +person using any shaving or barbery in London shall occupy any surgery, +letting of blood, or other matter, except of drawing teeth." Laws were +made, but they could not be, or at all events were not, enforced. Disputes +were frequent. The barbers acted often as surgeons, and the surgeons +increased their income by the use of the razor and shears. At this period +vigorous attempts were made to confine each to their legitimate work. + +The barber's pole, it is said, owes its origin to the barber-surgeons. +Much has been written on this topic, but we believe that the following are +the facts of the matter. We know that in the days of old bleeding was a +frequent occurrence, and during the operation the patient used to grasp a +staff, stick, or pole which the barber-surgeon kept ready for use, and +round it was bound a supply of bandages for tying the arm of the patient. +The pole, when not in use, was hung at the door as a sign. In course of +time a painted pole was displayed instead of that used in the operation. + +Lord Thurlow addressing the House of Lords, July 17th, 1797, stated, "by a +statute, still in force, barbers and surgeons were each to use a pole [as +a sign]. The barbers were to have theirs blue and white, striped, with no +other appendage; but the surgeons', which was to be the same in other +respects, was likewise to have a gully-pot and a red rag, to denote the +particular nature of their vocations." + +The Rev. J. L. Saywell has a note on bleeding in his "History and Annals +of Northallerton" (1885):--"Towards the early part of this century," +observes Mr. Saywell, "a singular custom prevailed in the town and +neighbourhood of Northallerton (Yorkshire). In the spring of the year +nearly all the robust male adults, and occasionally females, repaired to a +surgeon to be bled, a process which they considered essentially conduced +to vigorous health." The charge for the operation was one shilling. + +Parliament was petitioned, in 1542, praying that surgeons might be exempt +from bearing arms and serving on juries, and thus be enabled without +hindrance to attend to their professional duties. The request was granted, +and to the present time medical men enjoy the privileges granted so long +ago. + +In 1745, the surgeons and the barbers separated by Act of Parliament. The +barber-surgeons lingered for a long time, the last in London, named +Middleditch, of Great Suffolk Street, in the Borough, only dying in 1821. +Mr. John Timbs, the popular writer, left on record that he had a vivid +recollection of Middleditch's dentistry. + + + + +Touching for the King's Evil. + +BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S. + + +The practice of touching for the cure of scrofula--a disease more +generally known as king's evil--prevailed for a long period in England. +Edward the Confessor who reigned from 1042 to 1066, appears to be the +first monarch in this country who employed this singular mode of +treatment. + +About a century after the death of Edward the Confessor, William of +Malmesbury compiled his "Chronicle of the Kings of England," and in this +work is the earliest allusion to the subject. Holinshed has placed on +record some interesting details respecting Edward the Confessor. "As it +has been thought," says Holinshed, in writing of the king, "he was +inspired with the gift of prophecy, and also to have the gift of healing +infirmities and disease commonly called the king's evil, and left that +virtue, as it were, a portion of inheritance to his successors, the kings +of this realm." The first edition of the "Chronicle" was published in +1577, and from it Shakespeare drew much material for his historical +dramas. There is an allusion to this singular superstition in _Macbeth_, +which it will be interesting to reproduce. + +Malcolm and Macduff are in England, "in a room in the King's palace" (the +palace of King Edward the Confessor):-- + + "_Malcolm._ Comes the King forth I pray you? + + _Doctor._ Aye, sir! There are a crew of wretched souls + That stay his cure: their malady convinces + The great assay of art; but at his touch-- + Such sanctity hath heaven given his hand-- + They presently amend. + + _Malcolm._ I thank you, Doctor. + + _Macduff._ What's the disease he means? + + _Malcolm._ 'Tis called the evil: + A most miraculous work in this good King; + Which often, since my here-remain in England, + I've seen him do. How he solicits heaven, + Himself best knows: but strangely visited people + All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye, + The mere despair of surgery, he cures, + Hanging a golden stamp about their necks, + Put on with holy prayers: and 'tis spoken, + To the succeeding royalty he leaves + The healing benediction. With this strange virtue, + He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy, + And sundry blessings hang about his throne + That speak him full of grace." + +History does not furnish any facts respecting touching by the four kings +of the House of Normandy. It is generally believed that the Norman +monarchs did not practise the rite. + +Henry II., the first of the Plantagenet line, emulated the Confessor. We +know this fact from a record made by Peter of Blois, the royal chaplain, +in which it is clearly stated that the king performed certain cures by +touch. John of Gaddesden, in the days of Edward II., wrote a treatise in +which he gave instructions for several modes of treatment for the disease, +and if they failed, recommended the sufferers to seek cure by royal touch. +Bradwardine, Archbishop of Canterbury, lived in the reigns of Edward III. +and Richard II., and from his statements we learn that both kings kept up +the observance. + +Henry IV., the first king of the House of Lancaster, touched for the evil. +This we learn from a "Defence to the title of House of Lancaster," written +by Sir John Fortesque, Lord Chief Justice of the Court of King's Bench. He +speaks of the practice as "belonging to the kings of England from time +immemorial." This pamphlet is preserved among the Cottonian manuscripts in +the British Museum. + +The earliest king of the House of Tudor, Henry VII., was the first to give +a small gold piece, known as a touch-piece, to those undergoing the +ceremony. + +During the reign of the next monarch, Henry VIII., little attention +appears to have been given to the subject. It was at this period largely +practised in France. Cardinal Wolsey, when at the Court of Francis I., in +1527, witnessed the king touch two hundred people. On Easter Sunday, 1686, +Louis XIV. is recorded to have touched 1,600. He used these words:--"_Le +Roy te touche, Dieu te gueisse._" ("The King touches thee. May God cure +thee!") + +Coming back to the history of our own country, and dealing with the more +interesting passages bearing on this theme, we find that in the reign of +Queen Elizabeth, William Clowes, the Court Surgeon, believed firmly in the +efficacy of the royal touch. "The king's queen's evil," he says, "is a +disease repugnant to nature, which grievous malady is known to be +miraculously cured and healed by the sacred hands of the Queen's most +Royal Majesty, even by Divine inspiration and wonderful work and power of +God, above man's will, act, and expectation." In this reign, under the +title of "_Charisma; sive Donum Sanationis_," a book was published by +William Fookes bearing testimony to the cures effected by royal touch on +all sorts and conditions of people from various parts of the country. + +The Stuarts paid particular attention to the practice. No fewer than +eleven proclamations published during the reign of Charles I. are +preserved at the State Paper Office, and chiefly relate to the times the +afflicted might attend the court to receive the royal touch. In course of +time the king's pecuniary means became limited, and he was unable to +present gold touch-pieces, so silver was substituted, and many received +the rite of touch only. + +During the Commonwealth we have not any trace of Cromwell touching for the +malady. During the rising in the West of England, the Duke of Monmouth, +who claimed to be the rightful heir to the throne, touched several persons +for the evil, and, said a newspaper of the time, with success. One of the +charges made against him on his trial at Edinburgh for high treason, was, +that he had "touched children of the King's Evil." Two witnesses proved +the charge, having witnessed the ceremony at Taunton. + +No sooner had another Stuart obtained the English crown than the ceremony +was again performed. During the first year of the reign of Charles II., +six thousand seven hundred and twenty-five persons were brought to His +Majesty to be healed. The ceremony was often performed on a Sunday. Evelyn +and Pepys were witnesses of these proceedings, and in their Diaries have +recorded interesting particulars. Under date of 6th July, 1660, "His +Majesty," writes Evelyn, "began first to touch for ye evil, according to +custome thus: Sitting under his state in the Banqueting House, the +chirurgeons cause the sick to be brought or led up to the throne, where, +they kneeling, ye king strokes their faces and cheeks with both his hands +at once, at which instant a chaplaine in his fermalities says:--'He put +his hands upon them and healed them.' This he said to every one in +particular. When they have been all totched, they come up again in the +same order; and the other chaplaine kneeling, and having an angel of gold +strung on white ribbon on his arme, delivers them one by one to His +Majestie, who puts them about the necks of the touched as they passe, +while the first chaplaine repeats 'That is ye true light which came into +ye world.' Then follows an epistle (as at first a gospel) with the +liturgy, prayers for the sick, with some alteration, and then the Lord +Chamberlain and the Comptroller of the Household bring a basin, ewer, and +towel, for his Majesty to wash." + +Samuel Pepys witnessed the ceremony on April 13th, 1661, and refers to it +in his Diary. "Went to the Banquet House, and there saw the King heal, the +first time I ever saw him do it, which he did with great gravity, and it +seemed to me to be an ugly office and a simple one." + +In Evelyn's Diary on March 28th, 1684, there is a record of a serious +accident, "There was," he writes, "so great a concourse of people with +their children to be touched for the evil, that six or seven were crushed +to death by pressing at the chirurgeon's door for tickets." + +According to Macaulay, Charles II. during his reign touched nearly a +hundred thousand persons. In the year 1682 he performed the rite eight +thousand five hundred times. + +No person was allowed to enter the King's presence for the purpose of +receiving the rite without first obtaining a certificate from the minister +of his parish from whence he came, nor unless he had not previously been +touched. A proclamation of Charles II., dated January 9th, 1683, ordered a +register of the certificates to be made. Here is a record drawn from the +Old Town's Book of Birmingham:-- + + "March 14th, 1683, Elizabeth, daughter of John and Anne Dickens, of + Birmingham, in the county of Warwick, was certified for in order to + obtayne his Majesty's touch for her cure. + + HENRY GROVE, Minister. + JOHN BIRCH, } + HENRY PATER, } Churchwardens." + +We cull from the churchwardens' accounts of Terling, Essex, the following +item:-- + + "1683 Dec{r}. Pd. for his Majestie's order for touching 00.00.06." + +A page in the register book of Bisley, Surrey, is headed thus, +"Certificates for the Evill commonly called the kings Evill." Two entries +occur as follow:-- + + "Elizabeth Collier and Thomas Collier the children of Thomas Collier, + Senior, had a certificate from the minister and churchwardens of + Bisley, August 7th 1686." + + "Sarah Massey, the daughter of Richard Massey, had a certificate from + the minister and churchwardens of Bisley, 1st April 1688." + +Old parish accounts often contain entries similar to the following, from +Ecclesfield, Yorkshire:-- + + "1641. Given to John Parkin wife towards her + trauell to London to get cure of his Matie. + for the disease called Euill which her + soone Thom is visited withall 0. 6. 8." + +"The following extracts," says a contributor to _The Reliquary_ of +January, 1894, "from the Minute Books of the Corporation of the city of +York, show that general belief in the virtue of the touching by the King +was unshaken at the end of the seventeenth century. It must be borne in +mind that these Minutes do not record the acts of individuals, but were +those of the Corporation of what was at that time one of the most +important cities in the country, and that it was in administering Poor Law +Relief that the grants were made. + +In Vol. 38 of the Corporation Records, fo. 74b, under the date of February +28th, 1671, is the following:-- + + "Ordered that Elizabeth Trevis haue x{s} given her for charges in + carrying her daughter to London to be touched for the Evill." + +A few years later, on March 12th, 1678 (fo. 156b), occurs the +following:-- + + "Anne Thornton to haue x{s} for goeing to London to be touched for the + euill." + +And again on March 3, 1687 (fo. 249b), ten shillings was granted for +"carrying of Judith Gibbons & her Child & one Dorothy Browne to London to +be touched by his Majestie in order to be healed of the Kings Evil." + +The Records of the Corporation of Preston, Lancashire, contain at least +two references to this matter. In the year 1682 the bailiffs were +instructed to "pay unto James Harrison, bricklayer, 10s. towards carrying +his son to London, in order to the procuring of His Majesty's touch." + +Five years later, when James II. was at Chester, the council passed a vote +that "the Bailiff pay unto the persons undermentioned each of them 5s. +towards their charge in going to Chester to get his Majesty's +touch:--Anne, daughter of Abel Mope; ---- daughter Richard Letmore." + +It is recorded that James II. touched eight hundred persons in the choir +of the Cathedral of Chester. + +The ceremony cost, we learn from Macaulay, about L10,000 a year, and the +amount would have been much greater but for the vigilance of the royal +surgeons, whose business it was to examine the applicants, and to +distinguish those who came for the cure, and those who came for the gold. + +William III. declined to have anything to do with a ceremony he regarded +as an imposture. "It is a silly superstition," he said, when he heard that +at the close of Lent his palace was besieged by a crowd of sick. "Give the +poor creatures some money, and send them away." On one occasion only was +he induced to lay his hand on a sufferer. "God give you better health," he +said, "and more sense." + +The next to wear the crown was Queen Anne, and she revived the rite. In +the _London Gazette_ of March 12th, 1712, appeared an official +announcement that the queen intended to touch for the evil. In Lent of +that year, Dr. Johnson, then a child, went up to London with his mother in +the stage coach that he might have the benefit of the royal touch. He was +then between two and three years of age. "His mother," writes Boswell, +"yielding to the superstitious notion which, it is wonderful to think, +prevailed so long in this country as to the virtue of regal touch (a +notion to which a man of such inquiry and such judgment as Carte, the +historian, could give credit), carried him to London, where he was +actually touched by Queen Anne. Mrs. Johnson, indeed, as Mr. Hector +informed me, acted by the advice of the celebrated Sir John Floyer, then a +physician in Lichfield. Johnson used to talk of this very frankly, and +Mrs. Piozzi has preserved his very picturesque description of the scene as +it remained upon his fancy. Being asked if he could remember Queen Anne, +'He had,' he said, 'a confused but somehow a sort of solemn recollection +of a lady in diamonds and a long black hood.' This touch, however, was +without any effect." The malady remained with Dr. Johnson to his death. + +[Illustration: TOUCH-PIECE OF CHARLES II. (GOLD).] + +After the death of Queen Anne, no other English sovereign kept up the +custom, although the service remained in the "Book of Common Prayer" as +late as 1719. + +The latest instance we have found of the ceremony being performed was in +October, 1745, when Charles Edward, at Holyrood House, touched a child. + +[Illustration: (GOLD). TOUCH-PIECES OF JAMES II. (SILVER).] + +In the preceding pages we have referred to "touch pieces," and it will not +be without interest to direct attention to some of the more notable +examples. A small sum of money was given by Edward I., and it has been +suggested that it was probably presented in the form of alms. Henry VII. +gave a small gold coin known as the angel noble. It was of about six +shillings and eight pence in value, and was a current coin of the period, +and the smallest gold coin issued. On one side of the coin was a figure of +the angel Michael overcoming the dragon, and on the other a ship on the +waves. During the residence of Charles II. on the continent, those who +visited him to receive the royal rite had to give him gold, but after the +Restoration, "touch-pieces" were made expressly for presentation at the +healings. They were small gold medals resembling angels, but they were not +equal in value to the angels previously given. However they met a want +when gold was in great demand. James II. had two kinds of touch pieces, +one of gold and the other of silver, but they were not half the size of +those given by Charles II. Queen Anne gave a touch-piece a little larger +than that of James II. The touch-piece presented by this Queen to Dr. +Johnson may, with other specimens, be seen in the British Museum. + +[Illustration: TOUCH-PIECE OF ANNE (GOLD).] + +In a carefully-compiled article in the _Archaeological Journal_, vol. x., +p. 187-211, will be found some interesting particulars of touch-pieces, +and to it we are indebted for the few details we have given bearing on +this part of our subject. + + + + +Visiting Patients. + + +The doctor made his daily rounds, before the reign of Charles II., on +horseback, sitting sideways on foot-clothes. He must have cut an +undignified figure as he rode through the streets of London and our chief +towns. + +A change came after the Restoration, and we meet with the physicians +making their visits in a carriage and pair. It seems that increased fees +were expected with the introduction of the carriage. A curious note +appears on this subject in _Lex Talionis_. "For there must now be a little +coach and two horses," says the author, "and, being thus attended, +half-a-piece their usual fee is but ill taken, and popped into their left +pocket, and possibly may cause the patient to send for his worship twice +before he will come again in the hazard of another angel." The carriage +was popular, and physicians vied with each other in making the greatest +display. + +In the days of Queen Anne, a doctor would even drive half-a-dozen horses +attached to his chariot, and not fewer than four was the general rule. + +In our own time the doctor's carriage and pair is to be seen in all +directions. It is now driven for use and not for display as in the days of +Queen Anne. + +We have seen the bicycle used by doctors of good standing, and we predict +the time is not far distant when it will be more generally ridden by +members of the medical profession. + + + + +Assaying Meat and Drink. + +BY WILLIAM ANDREWS, F.R.H.S. + + +From the time of our earliest Norman king down to the days of James I., +the chief people of the land partook of their food in fear. Treachery was +a not infrequent occurrence, and poison was much used as a means of taking +life. As a precaution against murder, assayers of food, drink, etc., were +appointed. Doctors usually filled the office, and by their unremitting +attention to their duties crime was to a great extent prevented. In a +royal household the physician acted as assayer. + +Let us imagine ourselves in an old English home, the palace of a king, or +the stronghold of a leading nobleman. The cloth is laid by subordinate +servants, but not without considerable ceremony. Next a chief officer of +the household sees that every article on the table is free from poison. +The bread about to be consumed is cut, and, in the presence of the "taker +of assay," is tasted, and the salt is also tested. The knives, spoons, +and table linen are kissed by a responsible person, so that assurance +might be given that they were free from poison. Then the salt dish is +covered with a lid, and the bread is wrapped in a napkin, and afterwards +the whole table is covered with a fair white cloth. The coverlet remains +until the head of the household comes to take his repast, and then his +chief servant removes the covering of the table. If any person attempted +to touch the covered bread or the covered salt after the spreading of the +coverlet, they ran the risk of a severe flogging, and sometimes even death +at the hands of a hangman. + +The time of bringing up the meats having arrived, the assayer proceeds to +the kitchen, and tests the loyalty of the steward and cook by compelling +them to partake of small quantities of the food prepared before it is +taken to the table. Pieces of bread were cut and dipped into every mess, +and were afterwards eaten by cook and steward. The crusts of closed pies +were raised, and the contents tasted; small pieces of the more substantial +viands were tasted, and not a single article of food was suffered to leave +the kitchen without being assayed. After the ceremony had been completed, +each dish was covered, no matter if hot or cold, and these were taken by +servitors to the banqueting hall, a marshal with wand of office preceding +the procession. The bearers on no account were permitted to linger on the +way, no matter if their hands were burnt they must bear the pain, far +better to suffer that than be suspected of tampering with the food. On no +pretext were the covers to be removed until the proper time, and by the +servants appointed for that purpose. If very hot, the bearers might +perhaps protect their hands with bread, which was to be kept out of sight. + +We produce from the Rev. Charles Bullock's interesting volume entitled +"How they Lived in the Olden Time," a picture of bringing in the dinner. +It will be observed that the steward, bearing his staff of office, heads +the procession. + +Each dish as it was brought to the table was again tasted in the presence +of the personage who purposed partaking of it. This entailed considerable +ceremony, and took up much time. To render the delay as little unpleasant +as possible to the guests, music was usually performed. + +[Illustration: BRINGING IN THE DINNER.] + +In the stately homes of old England, as a mark of respect to the +distinguished visitor, it was customary to assign to him an assayer. +History furnishes a notable instance of an omission of the official. When +Richard II. was at Pontefract Castle, we gather from _Hall's Chronicle_, +edition 1548, folio 14, that Sir Piers Exton intended poisoning the King, +and, to use the chronicler's words, forbade the "esquire whiche was +accustumed to serve and take the assaye beefore Kyng Richarde, to again +use that manner of service." According to Hall, the King "sat downe to +dyner, and was served withoute curtesie or assaye; he much mervaylyng at +the sodayne mutacion of the thynge, demanded of the esquire why he did not +do his duty." He replied that Sir Piers had forbidden him performing the +duties pertaining to his position. The King immediately picked up a +carving-knife, struck upon the head of the assayer, and exclaimed, "The +devil take Henry of Lancaster and thee together." + +Paul Hentzner, a German tutor, visited England in 1598, and wrote a +graphic account of his travels in the country, which were translated into +English by Horace Walpole. The work contains a curious account of the +ceremonies of laying the cloth, etc., for Queen Elizabeth at Greenwich +Palace. The notice is rather long, but is so entertaining and informing +that it well merits reproduction. "A gentleman," it is stated, "entered +the room bearing a rod, and along with him another who had a table-cloth, +which, after they had both kneeled three times, with the utmost +veneration, he spread upon the table, and after kneeling again, they both +retired. Then came two others, one with the rod again, and the other with +a salt-cellar and a plate of bread: when they had kneeled, as the others +had done, and placed what was brought upon the table, they, too, retired +with the same ceremonies performed by the first. At last came an unmarried +lady (we were told she was a Countess), and along with her a married one, +bearing a tasting-knife; the former was dressed in white silk, who when +she prostrated herself three times in the most graceful manner, approached +the table, and rubbed the plates with bread and salt with as much care as +if the Queen had been present; when they had waited there a little time, +the Yeomen of the Guard entered bareheaded, clothed in scarlet, with a +golden rose upon their backs, bringing in at each turn a course of +twenty-four dishes, served in plate, most of it gilt; these dishes were +received by a gentleman in the same order they were brought, and placed +upon the table, while the lady-taster gave to each guard a mouthful to +eat, for fear of poison. During the time that this guard, which consists +of the tallest and stoutest men that can be found in all England, being +carefully selected for this service, were bringing dinner, twelve trumpets +and two kettle-drums made the hall ring for half-an-hour together. At the +end of the ceremonial, a number of unmarried ladies appeared, who, with +particular solemnity, lifted the meat off the table and conveyed it into +the Queen's inner and more private chamber, where, after she had chosen +for herself, the rest goes to the ladies of the Court." + +[Illustration: ASSAYING WINE.] + +Drink as well as food had to be assayed twice, once in the buttery and +again in the hall. The butler drank of the wine in the buttery, and then +handed it to the cup-bearer in a covered vessel. When he arrived at the +hall, he removed the lid of the cup, and poured into the inverted cover a +little of the wine, and drank it under the eye of his master. We give an +illustration, reproduced from an ancient manuscript, of an assayer tasting +wine. The middle of the twelfth century is most probably the period +represented. + +In the ancient assay cup, it is related on reliable authority, a charm was +attached to a chain of gold, or embedded in the bottom of the vessel. +This was generally a valuable carbuncle or a piece of tusk of a narwhal, +usually regarded as the horn of the unicorn, and which was believed to +have the power of neutralising or even detecting the presence of poison. + +Edward IV. presented to the ambassadors of Charles of Burgundy a costly +assay cup of gold, ornamented with pearls and a great sapphire, and, to +use the words of an old writer, "in the myddes of the cuppe ys a grete +pece of a Vnicornes horne." + +The water used for washing the hands of the great had to be tasted by the +yeoman who placed it on the table, to prove that no poison was contained +in the fluid. This ceremony had to be performed in the presence of an +assayer. + + + + +The Gold-headed Cane. + +BY TOM ROBINSON, M.D. + + +The stick takes many forms. It is the sceptre of kings, the club of a +police constable, the baton of a field marshal. The mace is but a stick of +office, being ornamental and merely symbolical. + +In history we may go back to the pilgrim's staff, which was four feet +long, and hollow at the top to carry away relics from the Holy Land. It +was also used to carry contraband goods, such as seeds, or silk-worms' +eggs, which the Chinese, Turks, or Greeks forbade to be exported. It is +occasionally used for eluding the customs now. Some people smuggle +diamonds into the United States in that way. + +Prometheus' reed, or marthex, in which he conveyed fire to "wretched +mortals," as Aeschylus tells us, is a well-known fable. + +An enormous amount of interest centres around the walking stick, and there +are few families in which we do not find an old stick handed down +generation after generation. Such an inheritance was at one time a common +possession of those who belonged to the medical profession. + +[Illustration: DR. RADCLIFFE'S CANE.] + +The College of Physicians possesses at the present time the gold cane +which Radcliffe, Mead, Askew, Pitcairn, and Baillie successively carried +about with them, and which Mrs. Baillie presented to that learned body. +The drawing here given is a representation of this cane, and it will be +seen that it has not a gold knob, but consists of an engraved handle or +crook. It is, I think, quite clear that the custom which the doctors of +the last century always followed in carrying their stick about with them, +even to the bed-side, was due entirely to the fact that the handle of the +cane could be, and was, filled with strong smelling disinfectants, such as +rosemary and camphor. The doctor held this against his nose obviously for +two reasons. One, to destroy any poison which might be floating about in +the air but chiefly to prevent him smelling unpleasant odours. This stick +was as long as a footman's, smooth and varnished. + +A belief in the protective power of camphor and other pleasant-smelling +herbs is still in existence, and we know quite a number of individuals who +carry about with them bags of camphor during the prevalence of an +epidemic. + +Before Howard exposed the deadly sanitary state of the prisons of this +country, it was the custom to sprinkle aromatic herbs before the +prisoners, so powerful was the noxious effluvium which exhaled from their +filthy bodies. The bouquet which the chaplain always carried when +accompanying a prisoner to Tyburn, was used for the same defensive +purpose. + +The stick of the physician's cane was probably a relic of the legerdemain +of the healer, who in superstitious times worked upon the ignorance of the +credulous. The modern conjuror always uses a wand in his entertainment. +These baubles die hard, because there is a strong conservative instinct in +the race which clings with tremendous tenacity to anything which has the +sanction of antiquity. + +The barber's pole is still seen even in London, and is striped blue and +white, emblems of the phlebotomist, and symbolical of the blue venous +blood, which was so ungrudgingly given by the sufferers from almost all +maladies. The white stripe represented the bandage used to bind up the +wound on the arm. + +The practice of the bleeders continued in fashion in England until the +beginning of this century. John Coutsley Lettsom, who possessed high +literary attainments, and who was President of the Philosophical Society +of London, and who entertained at his house at Grove Hill, Camberwell, +many of the most distinguished men of his time, including Boswell and Dr. +Johnson, and whose writings shew he was an enlightened physician, was bold +in his treatment of disease, and a heroic bleeder. He used to say of +himself:-- + + "When patients sick to me apply, + I physics, bleeds, and sweats 'em + Then if they choose to die, + What's that to me--I lets 'em." + +The wig also constituted an essential part of the dress of the older +physicians. It was a three tailed one, and this with silk stockings, +clothes well trimmed, velvet coat with stiff skirts, large cuffs and +buckled shoes, made quite an imposing show, and when they rode in their +gilt carriages with two running footmen, as was the custom, no one would +be better recognised. It is interesting to contrast the dress and mode of +practice of the modern physician with those who built up the honourable +calling of medicine. It is so easy to laugh at those who practised the art +of medicine before modern scientific investigation had laid naked so many +of the secrets of physiology, pathology, and vital chemistry. Slowly but +surely as the true nature and progress of disease has become known, so +have all the adventitious and unnecessary surroundings of dress +disappeared, and now we may meet the most eminent of our doctors, clad in +the same garments as a man on Change. All this was inevitable, but running +through the whole history of medicine is a magnificent desire on the part +of those who have made a mark, and of all its humbler followers to "go +about doing good." The difficulties are enormous, the labour is colossal, +but there could be no convictions were there no perplexities. Credulity is +the disease of a feeble intellect. Accepting all things and understanding +nothing, kills a man's intellect and checks all scientific investigation. +The physician has to knock at the temple of the human frame, and patiently +pick up the knowledge which nature always gives to those who love her +best. But the investigator must approach his subject with humility, and +with the recognition that there is a limit to the human intellect, and +that behind and above this big round world is a supreme being, that around +the intellect is the atmosphere of spiritual convictions from which our +highest and best impulses spring, that the universe not only embraces +material phenomena, but it also includes the sublime and the moral +attributes, which no man has, or ever will, weigh in the physical balance +or distil from a retort. + +The union of Intellect and Piety will grow stronger as the world grows +older. When men began to think, they began to doubt, but when men have +thought more deeply they will cease to doubt. + +An idea is in the air that the study of science has a tendency to make men +sceptical. This is an error. For surely the study of Nature in any of its +manifold aspects has a direct tendency to lead us into the inscrutable. +Amongst those who demonstrate the ennobling influence of science let us +only name Boyle, Bacon, Kepler, and Newton. If we would select a few names +from the number of medical celebrities of the past who have felt this +elevating influence, the following will readily occur to us, Linacre, +Sydenham, Brodie, Astley Cooper, Graves Watson, and Abernethy. The latter, +who is chiefly remembered as a coiner of quaint sayings and personal +originality, had, notwithstanding his biting wit, a deep sense of the +nobility and the sacredness of his calling, as the following extract from +a lecture which he delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons will prove. +He says:--"When we examine our bodies we see an assemblance of organs +formed of what we call matter, but when we examine our minds, we feel that +there is something sensitive and intelligible which inhabits our bodies. +We naturally believe in the existence of a first cause. We feel our own +free agency. We distinguish right and wrong. We feel as if we were +responsible for our conduct, and the belief in a future state seems +indigenous to the mind of man." + +The noiseless tread of time will cause many doctors whose names are now +household words to be forgotten, but we may rest assured that the wreath +of memory will cluster round the brows of these grand, noble workers in +the field of medicine who have shown by their daily life that they never +flinched from the arduous duties, aye and the dangers of their profession, +but steadfastly plodded on. Originality, integrity, and honesty are +attributes which grace the life of any man, and although the history of +medicine claims no monopoly of these virtues, for they serve all men +alike, yet they are the handmaids of greatness; without them no human +being will ever win that true success which enables us to look back upon +such lives and say, "Here are examples which show us the possibilities of +the race." Doctors ought to be great burden lifters. Their mission is to +carry into the chamber of disease--and even of death itself--that calm +courage, that buoyant hope, which has around it a halo of sympathy and of +encouragement. + +The public are loyal to the profession of medicine, and seldom do we hear +of any members of that calling who abuse their high privileges. Their work +is an absorbing work; it says to a man:--"You have placed in your hands +the lives of the human race. You are the true soldier whose business it +is to give life and health and happiness to those with whom you come in +contact. You must not lean upon the baubles of your calling, so as to +inspire confidence, but you must night and day let the one abiding thought +be concentrated upon the good of humanity," and there is no field of +professional experience which has given us so many men who have as nobly +done their duty as the doctors of the past and of the present day. We seem +to be on the threshold of a new era in the treatment of disease, and +already do we find an increase in the average lives of the race. No one +need despair of the future in that direction; indiscretion and ignorance +kill more human beings than plague, pestilence, or famine. The public must +help to tear away the veil which hides the _Truth_, by not worshipping at +the foot of Quackery, Chicanery, or Superstition. + +The medical profession has so far escaped the pernicious tendency of +modern thought, which tendency is to hamper every institution. This is a +noteworthy fact; our hospitals, medical schools, College of Physicians, +and College of Surgeons are not cramped and hindered by legislative +interference; but unostentatiously, silently, and with a never-failing +sense of their responsibilities, do they educate and pass through their +gates the doctors of the future--and no man dare point his finger at any +one of these, and say he does not do his duty. + + + + +Magic and Medicine. + +BY CUMING WALTERS. + + +Coleridge once said that in the treatment of nervous cases "he is the best +physician who is the most ingenious inspirer of hope." The great "faith +cures" are worked by such physicians, and the dealers in magic at all +times and in all parts achieved their successes by inspiring hope in their +patients. The more credulous the invalid the more easy the cure, no matter +what remedy is applied. Is it surprising, then, to find that among the +more childlike races, or that among the infant civilizations, magic often +supersedes medicine, or is combined with it? Ceremonies which impress the +mind and act upon the imagination considerably aid the physician in his +treatment of susceptible persons. Paracelsus himself combined astrology +with alchemy and medicine, and his host of followers often went further +than their master, and relied more upon magic than upon specific remedies. +It was the crowd of charlatans, astrologers, wonder-workers, and their +sort who substituted magic for medicine, and who had so great an influence +in England three centuries ago, that Ben Jonson scourged with the lash of +his satire in "The Alchemist," the impostor described as + + "A rare physician, + An excellent Paracelsian, and has done + Strange cures with mineral physic. He deals all + With spirits, he; he will not hear a word + Of Galen, or his tedious recipes." + +There has generally been sufficient superstition in all races to make +amulets the popular means of averting calamity and preserving from +sickness. The Greeks, the Romans, the Jews, the Turks, and the Arabs, to +say nothing of less civilized races, have thoroughly believed that disease +can be charmed away by the simple expedient of wearing a token, or +carrying a talisman. The magical formula of Abracadabra, written in the +form of a triangle, sufficed to cure agues and fevers; the Abraxas stones +warded off epidemics; the coins of St. Helena served as talismans, and +cured epilepsy. So strong was the belief in these magical protectors in +the fourth century that the clergy were forbidden, under heavy penalties +to make or to sell the charms, and in the eighth century the Christian +Church forbade amulets to be longer worn. In this connection it may be +mentioned that the custom of placing the wedding-ring upon the fourth +finger of the left hand owes its origin to the ancients who resorted to +magic for the cure of their ailments. The Greeks and the Romans believed +that the finger in question contained a vein communicating directly with +the heart, and that nothing could come in contact with it without giving +instant warning to the seat of life. For this reason they were accustomed +to stir up mixtures and potions with this "medicated finger," as it was +called, and when the ring became the symbol of marriage that finger was +chosen of all others for the wearing of it. Thus do we unknowingly keep +alive the superstitions of other times. + +The Hindoos, whose books on the healing art date back to 1500 B.C., +regarded sickness as the result of the operation of malevolent deities who +were either to be propitiated by prayers, offerings, charms, and +sacrifices, or to be overcome with the aid of friendly gods. The early +Greeks when suffering from disease were cured, not by means of medicine, +but by religious observances, and particularly by the "temple-sleep," in +which they dreamt dreams which the priests interpreted, and in which were +found the suggestions for remedy. It was Hippocrates, in 460 B.C., who +first proclaimed that disease was not of supernatural origin, and that it +could not be combated or cured by magic. But for many centuries later in +Europe the Black Art had greater sway than rational treatment. In Sweden +it is even now common for the lower classes to ascribe sickness to the +visitation of spirits (Nisse), who must be mollified by pouring liquor +into a goblet and mixing with it the filings of a bride-ring, or filings +of silver, or of any metal that has been inherited. The mixture is taken +to the place where the man is supposed to have caught his illness, and is +poured over the left shoulder, not a syllable being uttered the while. +After the performance of this ceremony the invalid may hope to recover. + +Consecrated grave-mould is supposed by many primitive races to have +particular properties as a medicine. The Shetlander who has a "stitch in +his side," cures himself by applying to the affected part, some dry mould +brought from a grave, and heated, care being taken to remove the mould and +to return it before the setting of the sun. In the neighbouring isles of +Orkney, magic is also resorted to as a remedy for disease. Perhaps the +least harmful of the rites is the washing of a cat in the water which had +previously served for an invalid's ablutions, the confident belief being +that the disease would by this means be transferred to the animal. This +custom of "substitution" is found in many races, and is one of the most +interesting subjects introduced to the student of folk-lore. + +In Tibet, for example, when all ordinary remedies have failed, the Lamas +make a dummy to represent the sick person, and they adorn the image with +trinkets. By ceremonies and prayers the sickness of the patient is laid +upon the dummy, after which it is taken out and burned, the Lamas +appropriating the ornaments as a reward. Sir Walter Scott tells of a +similar case which occurred in Scotland. Lady Katharine Fowlis made a +model in clay of a person whom she wished to afflict, and shot at the +image in the hope that the wound would be transferred to the real person. +We have only to turn to Scott's "Demonology and Witchcraft" to find +hundreds of instances of the unshaken belief of the Highlanders in mystic +potions, pills, drugs, and drops; and not even wholesale burnings of the +dealers in white magic could induce the people to forsake their +superstitions. Bessie Dunlop told the Court, before which she was +arraigned, of the magic elixirs given to her by Thome Reid, who had been +killed in battle centuries before, but had appeared to her as an +apparition, and begged her to fly with him to Elf-land. By means of his +medicines she cured the most stubborn diseases, obtained the reputation of +a wise woman, and grew so rich that the eye of the law was drawn upon her, +and, after her confession was made, she was ordered to be burnt. As Scott +said, in one of his chapters, the Scottish law did not acquit those who +accomplished even praiseworthy actions, and "the proprietor of a patent +medicine who should in those days have attested his having wrought such +miracles as we see sometimes advertised might have forfeited his life." + +The idea of sacrificing something, or someone, to appease the anger of the +powers who bring affliction upon mankind, is extremely common, and by no +means confined to savage nations or to very ancient times. At the time of +the Black Plague in the fourteenth century the fanaticism of the French +led them to sacrifice 12,000 Jews by torture and burning, these +Israelites being deemed the cause of the affliction. In the "Ingoldsby +Legends" may be read a ghastly account of a similar sacrifice in Spain, in +order to secure the good-will of the over-ruling powers on behalf of the +Queen. Even in comparatively modern times the practice of sacrificing in +order to cure or avert disease has not been unknown, and this in civilized +lands, too. The sacrifices in these cases have, of course, been of animals +only, but the germ of the old and worse ritual is found in the custom. In +1767, the people of Mull, in consequence of a disease among the cattle, +agreed to perform an incantation. They carried to the top of Carnmoor a +wheel and nine spindles of oakwood. Every fire in the houses was +extinguished; and the wheel was then turned from east to west over the +nine spindles long enough to produce fire by friction. They then +sacrificed a heifer, which they cut in pieces and burnt while yet alive. +Finally they lighted their own hearths from the pile, while an old man +repeated the words of incantation. This custom is prevalent in Ireland, in +various parts of Scotland, and even in England and Wales it has been +practised with variations and some modification. In Cornwall, in 1800, a +calf was burnt alive to arrest the murrain. Mr. Laurence Gomme has traced +the custom back to the sacrifice of animals for human sickness, for in +1678 four men were actually prosecuted for "sacrificing a bull in a +heathenish manner for the recovery of the health of Custane Mackenzie." In +Ireland a cure for small-pox consisted in sacrificing a sheep to a wooden +image, wrapping the skin about the sick person, and then eating the sheep. + +In Scotland strange and weird customs linger, and Sir H. G. Reid in his +entertaining volume, "'Tween Gloamin' and the Mirk," has related how he +himself, during infancy, underwent a mysterious cure for the "falling +sickness." He was carried secretly away to a lonely hut on the distant +moor, and the party were admitted to a long, low-roofed apartment, dimly +lighted from two small windows. In one corner sat an old woman, wrinkled +and silent, busily knitting; a huge peat-fire blazed on the open hearth, +shooting heavy sparks up through the hole in the roof, and filling the +apartment with smoke. No word was spoken, and the scene must have been as +eerie as the lover of mystery or the believer in witchcraft could have +desired. "I was placed on a three-legged stool in the middle of the +floor" (the writer continues); "the old woman rose, and with the aid of +immense tongs, took deliberately from the fire seven large smooth round +stones, they were planted one by one in an irregular circle about me; with +her dull dark eyes closed, and open white palms outstretched, the +enchantress muttered some mystic words; it was over--the tremulous patient +was taken up as 'cured!'" In Scotland the belief in witches who have power +both to cure and to cause maladies is so deeply founded that it would be +rash to deny its continued existence. These creatures are credited with +opening graves for the purpose of taking out joints of the fingers and +toes of dead bodies, with some of the winding-sheet, in order to prepare +powders. In Kirkwall a small portion of the human skull was taken from the +graveyard and grated to a powder in order to be used in a mixture for the +cure of fits; while in Caithness the patient was made to drink from a +suicide's skull, and the beverage so taken was regarded as a sovereign +specific for epilepsy. In 1643 one John Drugh was indicted for this +despoiling of corpses for some such purpose. The Australian aborigines +had a belief not altogether dissimilar to this. They rubbed weak persons +with the fat of a corpse, and thought that the strength, courage, and +valour of the dead man was communicated to the body subjected to the +treatment. Analogies may be found among savage tribes all over the world, +and the culmination is found in the devouring of enemies, not out of +revenge, but because the widespread primitive idea prevails that by eating +the flesh and by drinking the blood of the slain, a man absorbs the nature +or the life of the deceased into his own body. In other words, cannibalism +has a medical origin which the most depraved superstition suggested and +fortified. + +The Lhoosai, a savage hill-tribe in India, teach their young warriors to +eat a piece of the liver of the first man they kill in order to strengthen +their hearts, and here we see the development of the magic power of the +medicines which is not only efficacious for the body, but for the spirit. + +When Coleridge was a little boy at the Blue Coat School, he relates in his +Table Talk, there was a "charm for one's foot when asleep," which he +believed had been in the school since its foundation in the time of King +Edward VI. Its potency lay in the words-- + + "Crosses three we make to ease us, + Two for the thieves, and one for Christ Jesus." + +The same charm served for cramp in the leg, and Coleridge quaintly adds: +"Really, upon getting out of bed, where the cramp most frequently +occurred, pressing the sole of the foot on the cold floor, and then +repeating this charm, I can safely affirm that I do not remember an +instance in which the cramp did not go away in a few seconds." Charms like +this, by which a simple method of cure is invested with marvel, are common +enough among primitive races, and not infrequently provide the key to the +solution of the mystery of the magician's triumph. The cunning leaders, +priests, or medicine-men of ignorant nations maintain their ascendency by +ascribing to miracle the simplest feats they perform. + +The superstitious red man is completely at the mercy of the medicine-man +who claims to possess supernatural powers, and who assumes the ability to +work marvellous cures by magic. Each North American Indian carries with +him a medicine bag obtained under very curious circumstances. When he is +approaching manhood he sets forth in search of the patent drug which is to +shield him from all danger, and act as an all-powerful talisman. He lies +down alone in the woods upon a litter of twigs, eats and drinks nothing +for several days, and at last falls asleep from sheer exhaustion. Then he +dreams--or should do so--and whatever bird, or beast, or reptile, forms +the subject of his dream, he must seek as his medicine. He goes forth upon +the quest directly his strength has returned, and when he has discovered +the animal of his vision, he turns its skin into a pouch, and wears it +ever afterwards round his neck. In peace or war he will never part with +this talisman; it is the treasure of his life, a sacred possession, a +charm against all maladies, and a protection from foes. It is scarcely +necessary to add, after this, that the medicine-man of the tribe is held +in highest honour, and regarded as a worker of veritable miracles. All +things are possible to him. By his prayers, his rites, and his +incantations he causes the sun to shine, the rain to descend, the rivers +to deepen, the plants to thrive. A traveller tells us that a drought had +withered the maize fields, and the medicine-man was sent for to compel +the rain to fall. On the first day one Wah-ku, or the Shield, came to the +front, but failed; so did Om-pah, or the Elk. On succeeding days another +was tried, but without success; but at last recourse was made to +Wak-a-dah-ha-Ku, or the White Buffalo Hair, who possessed a shield +coloured with red lightnings, and carried an arrow in his hand. Much was +expected of him, and the people were not disappointed. "Taking his station +by the medicine-lodge," we are told, "he harangued the people, protesting +that for the good of his tribe he was willing to sacrifice himself, and +that if he did not bring the much desired rain he was content to live for +the rest of his life with the old women and the dogs. He asserted that the +first medicine-man had failed because his shield warded off the rain +clouds; the second, who wore a head-dress made of a raven's skin, because +the raven was a bird that soared above the storm, and cared not whether +the rain came or stayed; and the third who wore a beaver skin, because the +beaver was always wet and required no rain. But as for him, the red +lightnings on his shield would attract the rain-clouds, and his arrow +would pierce them, and pour the water over the thirsty fields. It chanced +that as he ended his oration, a steamer fired a salute from a twelve +pounder gun. To the Indians the roar of the cannon was like the voice of +thunder, and their joy knew no bounds. The successful medicine-man was +loaded with valuable gifts; mothers hastened to offer their daughters to +him in marriage; and the elder medicine-men hastened from the lodge to +enrol him in their order.... Just before sunset his quick eyes discovered +a black cloud which, unobserved by the noisy multitude, swiftly came up +from the horizon. At once he assumed his station on the roof of the lodge, +strung his bow, and made ready his arrow; arrested the attention of his +fellows by his loud and exultant speech; and as the cloud impended over +the village, shot his arrow into the sky. Lo, the rain descended in +torrents, wetting the rain-maker to the skin, but establishing in +everybody's mind a firm and deep conviction of his power." + +The influence of the medicine-man in time of sickness is illustrated in +the narrative of Mr. Kane, who wrote "The Wanderings of an Artist." He +heard a great noise in one of the villages, and found that a handsome +Indian girl was extremely ill. The medicine-man sat in the middle of the +room, crossed-legged and naked; a wooden dish filled with water was before +him, and he had guaranteed to rid the girl of her disease which afflicted +her side. He commenced by singing and gesticulating in a violent manner, +the others who surrounded him beating drums with sticks. This lasted +half-an-hour. Then the medicine-man determined on a radical cure of the +patient, for he darted suddenly upon the girl, dug his teeth into her side +(for she was undressed), and shook her for several minutes. This increased +her agony, but the medicine-man declared he had "got it," and held his +hands to his mouth. After this he plunged his hands into a bowl of water, +leaving the spectators to believe that he had torn out the disease with +his teeth, and was now destroying it by drowning. Eventually he withdrew +his hand from the bowl, and it was found that he held a piece of cartilage +between the finger and thumb. This was cut in two, and half cast into the +fire, half into the water. So ended the operation, and Mr. Kane records +that though the doctor was perfectly satisfied, the patient seemed, if +anything, to be worse for the treatment. + +The belief in magic was ingrained in the Egyptians, who, notwithstanding +that the art of medicine was far advanced with them, preferred to trust in +the workers of miracles and enchantments. In his recent collection of +Egyptian Tales, Mr. Flinders-Petrie is able to supply a striking instance +of this credulity. A man named Dedi was said to have such powers over life +and death that he could restore the head that had been smitten from the +body. He was brought before the King, who desired to put this marvellous +power to the test, and the story thus proceeds:--"His Majesty said, 'Let +one bring me a prisoner who is in prison that his punishment may be +fulfilled.' And Dedi said, 'Let it not be a man, O King, my lord; behold +we do not even thus to our cattle.' And a duck was brought unto him, and +its head was cut off. And the duck was laid on the west side of the hall, +and its head on the east side of the hall. And Dedi spake his magic +speech. And the duck fluttered along the ground, and its head came +likewise; and when it had come part to part the duck stood and quacked. +And they brought likewise a goose before him, and he did even so unto it. +His Majesty caused an ox to be brought, and its head cast on the ground. +And Dedi spake his magic speech. And the ox stood upright behind him, and +followed him with his halter trailing on the ground." This story prepares +us in every way for the information that the Egyptians, despite their +great knowledge of the curative powers of herbs and drugs, preferred to +rely upon enchanters, soothsayers, and magicians in their time of illness +and peril. + +Professor Douglas, in his "Society in China," devotes a very interesting +and entertaining chapter to medicine as regarded and practised by the +Celestials. From this we learn that while there are plenty of doctors in +the land, they are one and all the merest empirics, who prey on the folly, +the ignorance, and the dread of the uneducated people. The failure to cure +any disease brings no odium upon the quack, though when the late Emperor +"ascended on a dragon to be a guest on high," or, in other words, died of +small-pox, his physicians who could not save him from that distinction +were deprived of honours and rewards. The Chinese are centuries behind +other nations in medicine, and they have not yet learnt that the blood +circulates in the body, or that a limb may be removed with beneficial +effects in case of some diseases or accidents. They believe that arteries +and veins are one and the same, and that the pulses communicate with the +various organs of the body. The object of the physician is to "strengthen +the breath, stimulate the gate of life, restore harmony." "The heart is +the husband, and the hinges are the wife," and they must be brought into +agreement, or evil arises. Good results may be obtained, it is believed, +by such tonics as dog-flesh, dried red-spotted lizard-skins, +tortoise-shell, fresh tops of stag-horns, bones and teeth of dragons (when +obtainable), shavings of rhinoceros-horns, and such like. For dyspepsia +the doctor has no nostrum, but he thrusts a needle into the patient's +liver and expects him to be immediately cured. When cholera or any other +pestilence sweeps over the land, the Chinese feel the helplessness of +their physicians, so they resort to charms, and to the offering of gifts +to the gods by way of staying the plague. Hydrophobia is common among the +half-starved curs which infest the streets, and the cure for it--quite +unknown to Pasteur--is the curd of the black pea dried and pulverised, +mixed with hemp oil, and formed into a large ball; this is to be rolled +over the wound, then broken open, and kept on rolling until it has lost +its hair-like appearance. To complete the cure the patient must abstain +from eating "anything in a state of decomposition." He might just as well +be told not to poison himself. If, by the way, the prescription does not +work, but hydrophobia continues, the patient is strongly commended to try +the effect of "the skull, teeth, and toes of a tiger ground up, and given +in wine in doses of one-fifth of an ounce." While the tiger is being +caught, however, a fatal result may occur, but of course the Chinese +doctor is not to be blamed for that. He has done his best, and the fault +is obviously the tiger's. The Chinese believe in astrology, the +philosopher's stone, and the elixir of life. A plant known as ginseng is +said to greatly prolong and sweeten existence, and sometimes as much as a +thousand taels of silver are given for a pound's weight of the precious +root. It will be seen, therefore, from such facts as these that a Galen in +China would have a vast revolution to undertake, and that a thousand +Galens at least would be required to overcome the prejudices and uproot +the superstitions of the race. The great value which the Chinese attach to +the bones, horns, tusks, and eyes of animals may be judged from various +tonics and remedies which are in great request among all classes. A dose +of tigers' bones inspires courage; an elephant's eye burnt to powder and +mixed with human milk is a sovereign remedy for inflammation of the eye; +pulverised elephants' bones cure indigestion; a preparation of elephants' +ivory is the recognised cure for diabetes; and the same animal's teeth may +be used for epilepsy. But if the patient cannot eat rice his case is +abandoned as hopeless, and not even the physician who deals most +extensively in magic pills, ointments, and decoctions will attempt to save +the obstinate person's life. + +The medicine-men of the Eskimos were called angekoks, and enjoyed the +unlimited confidence of the people. They were said to have equal power +over heaven and earth, this world and the next. This made them useful as +friends and dangerous as enemies. The Eskimo, therefore, set out upon no +enterprise without consulting the angekoks, who granted blessings, +exorcised demons, and gave charms against disease. These medicine-men have +a profound belief in themselves, and though they resort to jugglery and +ventriloquism to deceive their visitors, they appear to have no idea that +they are perpetrating an imposture. Their particular powers, they think, +are derived from more than human sources. Dr. Nansen, in his "Eskimo +Life," points out that it has always been to the interests of the +medicine-men and the priests to sustain and mature superstitions or +religious ideas. "They must therefore themselves appear to believe in +them; they may even discover new precepts of divinity to their own +advantage, and thereby increase both their power and their revenues." The +Greenlanders believe that the angekoks work with the help of ministering +spirits, called _tornat_, who are often none other than the souls of dead +persons, especially of grandfathers; but not infrequently the _tornat_ are +supposed to be the souls of departed animals, or of fairies. The angekok +is assumed to have several of these councillors always at hand. They +render help in the time of danger, and may even act as avengers or +destroyers. In the latter case they show themselves as ghosts, and so +frighten to death the persons against whom vengeance is directed. +Therefore, as Dr. Nansen reports, the angekoks are the wisest and also the +craftiest of all Eskimos. They assert that they have the power of +conversing with spirits, of travelling in the under-world, of conjuring +up powerful spirits, and of obtaining revelations. "They influence and +work upon their countrymen principally through their mystic exorcisms and +_seances_, which occur as a rule in the winter, when they are living in +houses. The lamps are extinguished, and skins hung before the windows. The +angekok himself sits upon the floor. By dint of making a horrible noise so +that the whole house shakes, changing his voice, bellowing and shrieking, +ventriloquising, groaning, moaning, and whining, beating on drums, +bursting forth into diabolical shrieks of laughter and all sorts of other +tricks, he persuades his companions that he is visited by the various +spirits he personates, and that it is they who make the disturbance." They +cure diseases by reciting charms, and "give men a new soul." He demands +large fees, not for himself, he explains, but for the spirits whose agent +he is. Apparently these spirits have similar ideas to the London +consulting physician. + +Mr. Theodore Bent, in his "Ruined Cities of Mashonaland," gives a specimen +of the credulity excited by the medicine-men. The explorer desired to +interview a chief, Mtoko by name, but permission was refused. The reason, +he afterwards ascertained, was that the chief's father had died shortly +after another white man's visit, and the common belief was that he had +been bewitched. The chief thought that the "white lady" who ruled over the +nation to which Mr. Bent belonged had sent him purposely to cast a glamour +over him. It may be remembered that the ill-fated Lobengula refused to +have his portrait taken because he believed that by means of the image of +himself he could be magically infected with a dread disease. This idea of +substitution, which has already been referred to, is akin to that of the +belief in witchcraft during the middle ages--namely, that the witches +could, by sticking pins into the wax image of a person, bring upon that +person agonising maladies. The dreadful results of such beliefs among +savage tribes is told by the two hospital nurses who a year or so ago +produced a lively book, "Adventures in Mashonaland." One morning a native +entered their camp, bringing a tale of horror. A chief called Maronka, +whose kraal was about forty miles away, had boiled his family alive. He +had been convinced by the native doctors that after death the souls of the +chiefs passed into the bodies of lions. His medicine-men had "smelt out" +his own family as witches, and boiling alive was the requisite punishment. +Mr. Rider Haggard has told many such stories as this in his books on South +Africa. The Zulu doctors were in the habit, not only of "smelling out" +witches and evil spirits, but of sprinkling the soldiers with medicine, in +order to "put a great heart into them," and ensure their victory in +battle. + +Customs like these gave Charles Dickens his opportunity of writing two of +his most scathing satires "The Noble Savage" and "The Medicine Man of +Civilisation." He refused to subscribe to the popular and amiable +sentiment that the African barbarian was an interesting survival, or that +the Ojibbeway Indian was picturesque. After a severe indictment of them, +Dickens instanced their customs in medicine as a proof of their +irremediable depravity. "When the noble savage finds himself a little +unwell," he wrote, "and mentions the circumstance to his friends, it is +immediately perceived that he is under the influence of witchcraft. A +learned personage, called an Imyanger, or Witch Doctor, is sent for to +Nooker the Umtargartie, or smell out the witch. The male inhabitants of +the kraal being seated on the ground, the learned doctor, got up like a +grizzly bear, appears and administers a dance of the most terrific nature, +during the exhibition of which remedy he incessantly gnashes his teeth, +and howls,--'I am the original physician to Nooker the Umtargartie. Yow, +yow, yow! No connection with any other establishment. Till, till, till! +All other Umtargarties are feigned Umtargarties, Boroo, Boroo! but I +perceive here a genuine and real Umtargartie, Hoosh, Hoosh, Hoosh! in +whose blood, I, the original Imyanger and Nookerer, will wash these bear's +claws of mine!' All this time the learned physician is looking out among +the attentive faces for some unfortunate man who owes him a cow, or who +has given him any small offence, or against whom, without offence, he has +conceived a spite. Him he never fails to Nooker as the Umtargartie, and he +is instantly killed." This is no burlesque, and I have given the record in +Dickens's inimitable language because it most vividly sets before us the +custom of the medicine-men of barbarous races. But the medicine-men of +Longfellow's description, the men who came to appease and console +Hiawatha, who + + "Walked in silent, grave procession, + Bearing each a pouch of healing, + Skin of beaver, lynx, or otter, + Filled with magic roots and simples, + Filled with very potent medicines," + +--these may be accepted as the milder type of magicians who, among a +primitive people, claimed not only to be able to heal the living, but to +restore the dead. + +Mr. Austine Waddell, in his exhaustive work on the Buddhism of Tibet, +tells us that a very popular form of Buddha is as "the supreme physician" +or Buddhist AEsculapius, the idea of whom is derived from an ancient legend +of the "medicine-king" who dispensed spiritual medicine. The images of +this Buddha are worshipped as fetishes, and they cure by sympathetic +magic. The supplicant, after bowing and praying, rubs his finger over the +eye, knee, or particular part of the image corresponding to the affected +part on his own body, and then applies the finger carrying this hallowed +touch to the afflicted spot. Mr. Waddell says that this constant friction +is rather detrimental to the features of the god; whether it is beneficial +to the man's body is of course largely a matter of faith and +circumstances. As might be expected, talismans to ward off evils from +malignant planets and demons, whence come all diseases, are in great +request. The eating of the paper on which a charm has been written is +considered by the Tibetan to be the easiest and most certain method of +curing a malady, and the spells which the Lamas use in this way are called +"za-yig," or edible letters. A still more mystical way of applying these +remedies, according to Mr. Waddell, is by the washings of the reflection +of the writing in a mirror, a habit common in other quarters of the globe. +In Gambia, for instance, this treatment is relied upon by the natives. A +doctor is called in, he examines the patient, and then sits down at the +bedside and writes in Arabic characters on a slate some sentences from the +Koran. The slate is then washed, and the dirty infusion is drunk by the +patient. In Tibet, Chinese ink is smeared on wood, and every twenty-nine +days the inscription reflected in a mirror. The face of the mirror during +the reflection is washed with beer, and the drainings are collected in a +cup for the patient's use. This is a special cure for the evil eye. The +medicine-men of Tibet can also supply charms against bullets and weapons, +charms for the clawing of animals, charms to ward off cholera, and even +charms to prevent domestic broils. This is surely evidence of high +civilisation. + +It would be hopeless to endeavour to exhaust this subject. Only a few +selected instances can be given to illustrate how large a part magic has +played, and still plays, in the healing art. Medicine is by no means freed +of its superstitions yet, and the success of quack advertisements of the +day abundantly proves that the civilised public is still prone to believe +that universal remedies are obtainable, and that miracles can be wrought. + +Modern medical science, as one of its great exponents has pointed out, +plays a waiting game when miracles are spoken of, and when magic is +claimed to supersede specific remedies. "When it is asked to believe in +the violent and erratic violation of laws of matter and force, science +stands on an impregnable rock, fenced round by bulwarks of logical fact, +and flanked by the bastions of knowledge of nature and her constitution." +And as exact knowledge spreads, Prospero will have no alternative but to +break his staff, and bury it fathoms deep. + + + + +Chaucer's Doctor of Physic. + +BY W. H. THOMPSON. + + +In the "Canterbury Tales" we have an inimitable gallery of fourteenth +century portraits, drawn from life, with all a great master's delicacy of +finish and touch. And in none of these pictures does Chaucer excel himself +more than in that of his "Doctor of Physic." We may take it for granted +that the portrait is no mere fanciful one, with its pre-Raphaelite +minuteness of detail, sketched with the poet's own peculiar skill. With +what mischievous and yet altogether playful and good-natured humour is the +man of medicine presented to us! + + "With us there was a doctour of phisike + In all this world ne was there none like him + To speak of phisike and of surgerie." + +What manner of man was this paragon of medical knowledge? In personal +appearance he was somewhat of an exquisite. "Clothes are unspeakably +significant" saith the immortal Teufelsdrockh, and every practitioner who +has his _clientele_ largely yet to make knows the importance of being +well dressed. Chaucer's grave graduate was apparelled in a purple surcoat, +and a blue and white furred hood. + + "In sanguine and in perse he clad was all + Lined with taffata and with sendall," + +and yet no luxurious sybarite by any means was he, + + "Of his diet measureable was he, + For it was no superfluity, + But of great nourishing and digestable." + +A man of simple habits, even perhaps given to holding his purse strings +somewhat tightly. + + "He was but easy of expense, + He kept that he won in pestilence." + +For, as the poet adds with his characteristic merry sly humour, + + "Gold in physic is a cordial, + Therefore he loved gold in special." + +The science of medicine since Chaucer's day has made extraordinary +advances, and it is only fair to judge his doctor by contemporary +standards. To-day, we fear, he would be largely regarded as little better +than a charlatan and a quack. It is true, he was acquainted with all the +authorities, ancient and modern, from AEsculapius and Galen down to +Gaddesden, the author of the "Rosa Anglica," the great English book of +fourteenth century medicine. But this last named luminary of physic would +aid him very little on the road to true knowledge. This medical "Rose," +which Leland calls a "large and learned work," only serves to illustrate +the impotence of the professors of the healing arts at that period. This +is the recipe of Gaddesden for the small-pox. "After this (the appearance +of the eruption) cause the whole body of your patient to be wrapped in red +scarlet cloth, and command everything about the bed to be made red. This +is an excellent cure. It was in this manner I treated the son of the noble +king of England when he had the small-pox, and I cured him without leaving +any marks." To cure epilepsy, he orders the patient "and his parents" to +fast three days, and then go to church. "The patient must first confess, +and he must have mass on Friday and Saturday, and then on Sunday the +priest must read over the patient's head the gospel for September, in the +time of vintage after the feast of the Holy Cross. After this the priest +shall write out this portion of the gospel reverently, and bind it about +the patient's neck, and he shall be cured." If epilepsy was to be +exorcised by such a remedy as this, we venture to assert that it must have +been largely a case of faith-healing. + +[Illustration: GEOFFREY CHAUCER. + +(_From Harleian M.S.--4866 fol. 91._)] + +Seeing then that such was the condition of the science of medicine in +Chaucer's days, we must take with a good deal of reservation his statement +that his doctor + + "Knew the cause of every malady + Were it of cold, or hot, or moist, or dry, + And where engendered, and of what humour." + +Anyhow, some of the remedies prescribed for the "sick man," and the +"drugs," which his friends the apothecaries were so ready to supply, would +have seemed extraordinary enough to us. + +The poet tells us the doctor's study was but "little in the Bible," and +that though a "perfect practitioner," the ground of his scientific +knowledge was astronomy, _i.e._, astrology; the "better part of medicine," +as Roger Bacon calls it. In dealing with his patients he was guided by +"natural magic." + +To this practice Chaucer alludes in another of his poems, the "House of +Fame." + + "And clerks eke, which con well, + All this magic naturell, + That craftily do her intents, + To make in certain ascendents, + Images--lo through which magic, + To make a man be whole or sick." + +So that in spite of what appears to us the charlatanry in his make up, the +doctor was supposed to be a person of importance in the eyes of his fellow +pilgrims, with quite the standing of an accredited medical man of to-day, +is evidenced by the manner in which mine host Bailly addresses him. Master +Bailly was no particular respecter of persons, indeed, on the contrary, he +was somewhat of a Philistine; yet he was all respect to this man of +medicine. It is as "Sir" Doctor of Physic, the host addresses him; also +declaring him to be a "proper man," and like a prelate. After the story of +chicanery related by the Canon's Yeoman, it is to the physician he looks +to tell a tale of "honest matter." Such is his bearing towards him +throughout. + +The doctor's contribution to the "Canterbury Tales," too, is of a serious, +sober kind, in keeping with his character; and concludes with some sound +moral advice. Therefore, whatever foibles he may have, the "doctor of +physic" is presented to us as a sterling gentleman, no unworthy +predecessor of those who to-day, on more modern lines, still follow in his +footsteps. + + + + +The Doctors Shakespeare Knew. + +BY A. H. WALL. + + "O, mickle is the powerful grace that lies + In herbs, plants, shrubs, and their true qualities. + For nought so vile that on the earth doth live + But to the earth some special good doth give; + Nor ought so good, but, strained from that fair use + Revolts from true birth, stumbling on abuse." + --_Romeo and Juliet._ + + "By medicine life may be prolong'd."--_Cymbeline V. 5._ + + +In Walckenaer's "Memoirs of Madame de Sevigne," and in the amusing, +interesting volume which Gaston Boissier devoted to her works and letters, +we have glimpses of the medical profession in France, which show us it was +in her time and country, just what it was in England in the same century +when it was known to Shakespeare. For one more or less genuine physician +there were thousands of charlatans and quacks, and the contempt which our +great dramatic poet frequently expresses in his works for medical +practitioners must, in fairness, be regarded as applicable to the latter, +not to the former. In 1884, an American writer on this subject (Dr. Rush +Field, in his "Medical Thoughts of Shakespeare") strove to show that our +great philosophic poet and playwright's opinion of all the medical +practitioners was a low one. "He uses them frequently," he says, "as a +tool by which deaths are produced through the means of poison, and +generally treats them with contempt." That he might fairly do this, and +that in doing it he rather displayed respect and regard for the genuine, +more or less scientific professors of the healing art, can be very readily +demonstrated by anyone at all familiar with his plays. But to return to +Madame de Sevigne. At a time when she was growing old, when her letters +speak so sadly of the dying condition of Cardinal de Retz at Commercy, of +Madame de la Fayette's being consumed by slow fever, and La Roche confined +to his armchair by gout, of Corbinelle's threatened insanity, and of his +taking "potable gold" as a remedy for headache, she writes also of +small-pox and other fevers having permanently settled at Versailles and +Saint-Germain, where the King and Queen were attacked, and ladies and +gentlemen of the Court were decimated, and cases of apoplexy and +rheumatism were rapidly increasing in every direction. "Fashionable folk, +used up with pleasure-making, sick through disappointed ambition, +fidgetting without motive, agitating without aim, tainted with morbid +fancies and suspicion," found themselves in the doctor's hands, and were +far more ready to select practitioners who promised magically swift and +easy cures, than those who spoke of slow and gradual recovery by means +which were neither painless nor pleasurable. "Everybody," says Boissur, +"women included, battled with one another to possess marvellous secrets +whereby obstinate complaints should be immediately cured. Madame Fouquet +applied a plaster to the dying Queen, which cured her, to the great +scandal of the Faculty unable to save her; and the Princess de Tarente +served out drugs to all her people at Vitre. + +[Illustration: WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. + +(_The Stratford Portrait._)] + +Madame Sevigne wrote of her as "the best doctor in the upper classes; she +has rare and valuable compounds of which she gives us three pinches with +prodigious effect." When writing to her daughter, she begs her not to +neglect taking such medicines as "cherry water," "extract of periwinkles," +"viper-broth," "uric acid," and "powdered crab's-eyes." She says the +extract of periwinkles "endowed Madame de Grignam with a second youth." +Writing to her daughter, "If you use it, when you re-appear so fair +people will cry, 'O'er what blessed flower can she have walked,' then I +will answer 'On the periwinkle.'" She tells, too, how the Capuchins, who +still retained their ancient medical reputation, treated the rheumatism in +her leg "with plants bruised and applied twice a day; taken off while wet +twice a day, and buried in the earth, so that as they rotted away her +pains might in like way decrease." "It's a pity you ran and told the +surgeons this," she says to her daughter, "for they roar with laughter at +it, but I do not care a fig for them." In like way Madame de Scudery tells +Bassy, "There is an abbe here who is making a great bother by curing by +sympathy. For fever of all kinds, so they say, he takes the patient's +spittle and mingles it with an egg, and gives it to a dog; the dog dies +and the patient recovers.... They say he has cured a quantity of people." + +Turning from these illustrations of medical practice in France to see how +identical it is with that adopted in England when Shakespeare lived, we +recall the advice of that eminent gentleman, Andrew Rourde, who recommends +people to wash their faces once a week only, using a scarlet cloth to wipe +them dry upon, as a sure remedy in certain cases. In other instances we +find that certain pills made from the skulls of murderers taken down from +gibbets, and ground to powder for that purpose, were popular as medicine, +that a draught of water drunk from a murdered man's skull had wonderful +medicinal properties, and that the blood of a dragon was absolutely +miraculous in the cures it effected. The touch of a dead man's hand was +another ghastly remedy in common use, and the powder of mummy was a +wonderful cure for certain grave complaints. Love-philtres were also +regarded from a medicinal point of view, and the strange doings of quack +_accoucheurs_ are not less absurdly terrible. That the seventeenth century +physician himself was not always proof against these products of ancient +ignorance and superstition, is abundantly apparent. Van Helmont, the son +of a nobleman, born in Brussels, and very carefully educated for his +profession, practised both medicine and magic medicinally. He rejected +Galen, inclined to that illiterate pretender Paracelsus, and determined +that the only way by which he could defy disease, and utterly destroy it, +was through what he called _Archaeus_. Speaking of digestion, for instance, +he denied that it was either chemical or mechanical in its nature, but the +result of this _Archaeus_, a spiritual activity, working in a very +mysteriously complicated way, for both evil and good. It has been said +that he was one of Lord Bacon's disciples, but for that assertion there +certainly is no sufficient foundation, for Bacon, if a mystic by +inclination, was logical in reasoning. In England Van Helmont had an +English follower in the person of another physician, Dr. Fludd, a disciple +of the famous inventor of the camera obscura, and conjecturally the first +photographer. His grand quack remedy was "the powder of sympathy," which +was the "sword-salve" of Paracelsus (composed of moss taken from the skull +of a gibbetted murderer, of warm human blood, human suet, linseed oil, +turpentine, etc.). This was applied, not to the wound, but to the sword +that inflicted it, kept "in a cool place!" Certain plants pulled up with +the left hand were regarded as a sure remedy in fever cases, but the +gatherer, while gathering, was not to look behind, for that deprived the +plants of their medicinal value. + +Amongst other physicians of Shakespeare's century was Mr. Valentine +Greatrake, who came to London from Ireland, where his supposed magical +cures had been awakening a great sensation. He hired a large house in +Lincoln's Inn Fields, to which vast crowds of patients of all kinds and +conditions crowded daily, all clamouring to be cured. He received them in +their order, says an eye-witness, with "a grave and simple countenence." +For, as Shakespeare wrote, "Thus credulous fools are caught." ("Comedy of +Errors," 1, 2.) Greatrake (afterwards executed for high treason) asserted +that every diseased person was possessed by a devil, and that by his +prayers and laying on of hands the devil could be cast out. Lord Conway +sent for him to cure an incurable disease from which his wife was +suffering, and even some of the most learned and eminent people of the +time were amongst his patrons. St. Evremond wrote, "You can hardly imagine +what a reputation he gained in a short time. Catholics and Protestants +visited him from every part, all believing that power from heaven was in +his hands." + +In an Act of Parliament which was passed in the year 1511, we read, in its +preamble, that "the science and cunning of Physic and Surgery" was +exercised by "a great multitude of ignorant persons, of whom the greater +part have no manner of insight in the same, nor in any other kind of +learning--some also can read no letters in the book--so far forth that +common artificers, as smiths, weavers, and women, boldly and accostumably +took upon them great cures, and things of great difficulty, in which they +partly used sorceries and witchcraft, and partly supplied such medicines +unto the diseased as are very noisome, and nothing meet therefore; to the +high displeasure of God," etc. + +A large number of the pretended remedies thus used in medical practice are +clearly traceable back to the ancient Magi, who were professors of +medicine, as well as priests and astrologers. + +With these facts before you, turn to your Shakespeare, and see how he +regarded the popular delusions thus created and fostered, with their + + "Distinguished cheaters, prating mountebanks, + And many such libertines of sin." + --_Comedy of Errors._ + +Do you remember the other lines from this source, in which the poet speaks +of "This pernicious slave," who "forsooth took on him as a conjurer, and, +gazing in mine eyes, feeling my pulse, and with no face, as't were, +outfacing me, cried out I was possessed." This is not the stern, grave +doctor in "Macbeth," who did not pretend to "raze out the written troubles +of the brain," but said, "Therein the patient must minister unto himself." +There is no depreciation of the healing art in Shakespeare's painting of +Lear's physician, as there is of the "caitiff wretch" of an apothecary, +who sold poison to Romeo in a very different way to that in which the +physician in Cymbeline supplied a deadly drug to the Queen. "I beseech +your grace," says he, speaking in solemn earnestness, "without offence +(my conscience bids me ask) wherefore you have commanded of me these most +poisonous compounds." In "All's well that Ends Well," you will recognize +the foregoing descriptions of medicinal delusions in the interview between +Helena and the King, who says, we "may not be so credulous of cure, when +our most learned doctors leave us, and the congregated college have +concluded that labouring art can never ransom Nature from her maid estate, +I say we must not so stain our judgment, or corrupt our hope, to +prostitute our past-cure malady to empirics." In this play both "Galen and +Paracelsus" are mentioned, and their names then represented rival schools +of medicine. + +How smartly and merrily Shakespeare wrote of such cures as Greatrake +professed to effect, we see in Henry VI., where Simpcox, supposed to be +miraculously cured of blindness, is asked to and does describe what he +sees, "If thou _hadst_ been born blind, thou might'st as well have known +all our names as thus to name the several colours we do wear." + +In the "Merry Wives of Windsor" we have "Master Caius that calls himself +doctor of physic," and is called by Dame Quickly a "fool and physician." +The two were in Shakespeare's time very commonly combined, and often, as +we have shown, very strangely. Dr. Caius was a real name borne by a +learned gentleman who was physician to Queen Elizabeth. In Cymbeline the +name of the physician is Cornelius. This again was the name of a real +physician, who, in the sixteenth century, gained great reputation in +Europe chiefly by restoring Charles V. to health after a tediously long +illness. We may presume that Shakespeare was familiar with the fact. + +Amongst the doctors of our poet's time it was a common custom to throw up +cases when they believed them hopeless. Shakespeare's Sempronius says, +"His friends, like physicians, thrice gave him o'er," and Lord Bacon in +his work on "The Advancement of Learning," says of Physicians, "In the +enquiry of diseases, they do abandon the cures of many, some as in their +nature incurable, and others as past the period of cure, so that Sylla +triumvirs never prescribed so many men to die as they do by their ignorant +edicts." We have spoken of the sword-salve cure for wounds. Of dealers in +poison who visited fairs and market-places, and attracted crowds by the +aid of a stage fool, we get a glimpse in "Hamlet," where Laertes says:-- + + "I bought an unction of a mountebank, + So mortal, that but dip a knife in it, + Where it draws blood, no cataplasm so rare + Collected from all simples that have virtue, + Under the moon can save the thing from death." + +There is a hit at doctors who gave others remedies they had not enough +faith in to adopt for themselves:-- + + "Thou speak'st like a physician, Helicarnus: + Who minister'st a potion unto me + That thou would'st tremble to receive thyself." + --_Pericles._ + +In the same play the true physician receives full appreciation. Cerimon +says of himself:-- + + "'Tis known, I ever + Have studied physic, through which secret art, + By turning o'er authorities, I have + Together with my practice, made familiar + To me, and to my aid, the blest infusions + That dwell in vegitives, in metals, stones. + And I can speake of the disturbances + That nature works, and of her cures; which doth give me + A more content in course of true delight + Than to be thirsty after tottering honour, + Or tie my treasure up in silken bags, + To please the fool, and death." + +And one of the two listening gentlemen adds:-- + + "Your honour has through Ephesus pour'd forth + Your charity, and hundreds call themselves + Your creatures, who by you have been restored." + +And Pericles, with his supposed dead wife in his arms, turning to Cerimon, +who has saved her from the grave, says:-- + + "Reverend Sir, + The gods can have no mortal officer + More like a god than you." + +And Gower, speaking the concluding lines of the play, adds:-- + + "In reverend Cerimon there well appears + The worth that learned charity aye wears." + + "_Cerimon_: I hold it ever + Virtue and cunning (wisdom) were endowment greater + Than nobleness and riches...." + +There was, perhaps, when Shakespeare wrote the above lines, some thought +of the Elizabethan nobleman, Edmund, Earl of Derby, who "was famous for +chirurgerie, bone-setting, and hospitalite," as Ward says in his Diary; of +the Marquis of Dorchester, who in his time was a Fellow of the College of +Surgeons; or of the poet's son-in-law, Dr. Hall, a gentleman who resided +in Stratford-on-Avon, in a fine old half timber house still standing, and +known as Hall's Croft. To his wife, the poet's elder daughter, Shakespeare +bequeathed his house and grounds, which Dr. Hall occupied when he died. +His grave is near that of his glorious father-in-law, and on it is the +following inscription:-- + + "HERE LYETH Y{E} BODY OF JOHN HALL, + GENT: HE MARR: SVSANNA Y{E} DAUGHTER + AND CO HEIRE OF WILL. SHAKESPEARE, + GENT. HEE DECEASED NOVE{R} 25 A{O} 1635 + AGED 60. + + Hallius hic situs est medica celeberrimus arte + Expectans regni gaudia laeta Dei + Dignus erat meritis qui Nestora vinceret annis, + In terris omnes, sed rapit aequa dies; + Ne tumulo, quid desit adest fidissima conjux + Et vitae Comitem nunc quoque mortis habet." + + + + +Dickens' Doctors. + +BY THOMAS FROST. + + +Dickens, it must be admitted by even the greatest admirers of his +inimitable genius, among whom the writer of this paper must be counted, +was not successful in his delineations of the medical profession. Though +his most humorous as well as his most pathetic pictures of human life are +drawn from the humbler walks in the pilgrimage of humanity, he has given +us some good touches of his skill in his presentments of other +professions, and notably of lawyers and lawyers' clerks. Nothing in +fiction can excel his legal characters in, for instance, "Bleak +House,"--his Mr. Tulkinghorn, Mr. Guppy, the clerk, and Mr. Snagsby, the +law stationer. But a life-like doctor cannot be found in his works, and +the nearest approaches to such a description are the merest sketches. + +The most strongly marked of these are Dr. Parker Peps and Mr. Pilkins, the +two members of the faculty who officiate at the closing scene in the life +of Mrs. Dombey, in which a sense of humour, with difficulty suppressed by +the author, mingles with the touching sadness of the death. Dr. Parker +Peps, "one of the Court physicians, and a man of immense reputation for +assisting at the increase of great families," is introduced "walking up +and down the drawing-room with his hands behind him, to the unspeakable +admiration of the family surgeon, who had regularly puffed the case for +the last six weeks among all his friends and acquaintances as one to which +he was in hourly expectation, day and night, of being summoned in +conjunction with Dr. Parker Peps." But in this little interlude, the two +actors in which do not appear again, the obsequiousness of Mr. Pilkins to +the Court physician, and the manner in which the latter, with assumed +obliviousness, substitutes "her grace, the duchess" or "her ladyship" for +Mrs. Dombey, verge on caricature, a tendency Dickens seems to have had at +all times some difficulty in resisting. + +Of Dr. Slammer also we have only a sketch, and that of the slightest +character. Though he is described as "one of the most popular personages +in his own circle," we gather from the incidents in which he appears only +that he was very irascible. As we read of his furious jealousy of Jingle, +and the interrupted duel with Winkle, who had received his challenge to +the former by mistake, we wonder at the circle in which this "little fat +man, with a ring of upright black hair round his head, and an extensive +bald plain on the top of it," was one of the most popular personages. +Harold Skimpole, we are told, had been educated for the medical +profession; but his training seems to have left no traces of it upon his +character or his conversation. He prefers to dabble in literature and +music for his own amusement, and look to his friends for the means of +living, too prosaic an occupation for himself. + +One of the best, but not quite the best, of the medical characters in +Dickens' novels, is Allan Woodcourt, who "had gone out a poor ship's +surgeon, and had come home nothing better,"--the young man hastily called +in when the death of Nemo is discovered, in conjunction with "a testy +medical man, brought from his dinner, with a broad snuffy upper lip, and a +broad Scotch tongue." Allan Woodcourt has the kindness of heart which +characterises the profession, and exemplifies it very pleasingly in the +scene with the brickmaker's wife, and with poor Jo, the forlorn waif who +is kept continually moving on by the police. How tenderly, too, he deals +with Richard Carstone, the weak-minded victim of the long-drawn Chancery +suit. And his head is as sound as his heart is soft. "You," says Richard +to him, "can pursue your art for its own sake, and can put your hand to +the plough and never turn; and can strike a purpose out of anything." What +a world of difference we see in this briefly sketched trait to the want of +earnestness of purpose and steadfastness of pursuit in the character of +young Carstone! + +Even stronger testimony to the good qualities of Allan Woodcourt is borne +by Mr. Jarndyce. Allan, says that gentleman, is "a man whose hopes and +aims may sometimes lie (as most men's sometimes do, I dare say) above the +ordinary level, but to whom the ordinary level will be high enough after +all, if it should prove to be a way of usefulness and good service leading +to no other. All generous spirits are ambitious, I suppose; but the +ambition that calmly trusts itself to such a road, instead of +spasmodically trying to fly over it, is the kind I care for. It is +Woodcourt's kind." The love passages of this estimable young man with the +equally estimable Esther Summerson, one of Dickens' most charming +presentments of English maidenhood, are very pleasing, and none of them +more so than one which occurs towards the close of the story. + +There is another medical character in one of the Christmas stories which, +good as it is, might have been made better but for the extent to which the +exigencies of space limited the author in the development of character in +that class of stories. I mean Dr. Jeddler, the genial but mistaken father +of Grace and Marion, in "The Battle of Life." The doctor is "a great +philosopher, and the heart and mystery of his philosophy was to look upon +the world as a gigantic practical joke; as something too absurd to be +considered seriously by any practical man. His system of belief had been +in the beginning part and parcel of the battle ground on which he lived." +He is not of the cynical school, but a modern Democritus, whose +inclination to laugh at everything on the surface of the ocean of life was +irresistible, while there was nothing in the conditions of his existence +to suggest anything that was beneath. When he hears his daughters +conversing about their lovers, "his reflections as he looked after them, +and heard the purport of their discourse, were limited at first to certain +merry meditations on the folly of all loves and likings, and the idle +imposition practised on themselves by young people who believe for a +moment that there could be anything serious in such bubbles, and were +always deceived--always." + +Dr. Jeddler is a widower; we are not told what his experiences of married +life had been. Had they been unhappy, one would suppose that he would have +been more disposed to be cynical and pessimistic than to regard life's +incidents as provocative of merriment, yet, if they had been happy, why +should he have regarded the engagement of Grace as an idle folly, a bubble +on life's surface, soon to burst? Dickens' explanation is, from this point +of view, scarcely satisfactory. "He was sorry," says the novelist, "for +her sake--sorry for them both--that life should be such a very ridiculous +business as it was. The doctor never dreamed of inquiring whether his +children, or either of them, helped in any way to make the scheme a +serious one. But then he was a philosopher. A kind and generous man by +nature, he had stumbled by chance over that common philosopher's stone +(much more easily discovered than the object of the alchemist's +researches) which sometimes trips up kind and generous men, and has the +fatal property of turning gold to dross, and every precious thing to poor +account." + +But when sorrow had humbled the doctor's heart, he felt that the world in +which some love, deep-anchored, is the portion of every human creature, +was more serious than he had thought it, and understood "how such a trifle +as the absence of a little unit in the great absurd account had stricken +him to the ground." Then, when he and his daughters are again together in +the old home, and his arms are about them both, we find him acknowledging +that "It's a world full of hearts, and a serious world with all its +folly,--even with mine, which was enough to swamp the whole world." + +It is to be observed, however, that while we find all the traits and +incidents of professional life in the lawyers of Dickens' creation, there +is little or nothing of the kind in his doctors. Such traits are abundant +in his presentments of Tulkinghorn, and Kenge, and Vholes in Wickfield, +and many others that might be named; but they are so completely absent +from his portrayals of Allan Woodcourt and Dr. Jeddler, that the two men +might as well have been of any other profession, without any loss to the +stories in which they appear. If we compare them with his lawyers, or with +the clergymen of Mrs. Oliphant, we are struck at once with the difference. + +[Illustration: CHARLES DICKENS.] + +This is not the case, however, when from the full-blown medical +practitioner, adding to his name the initials M.D. or M.R.C.S., we descend +to the "sawbones in training," as the facetious Sam Weller designates the +young men qualifying themselves for the exercise of the profession by +"walking the hospitals." The medical students of the novelist's early +days were--it would perhaps be fairer to say that a large proportion of +them were--a turbulent and disorderly element in the social life of the +metropolis. The newspapers of the day record their frequent appearances at +the Bow Street and Marlborough Street police-courts on charges of rowdyism +in the streets at or after midnight, when they came out from their +favourite places of amusement, the Coal Hole, in the Strand, the Cider +Cellars, in Maiden Lane, and the Judge and Jury Club, in Leicester Square, +the latter presided over by Renton Nicholson, who edited a vile +publication called _The Town_. Their after-amusements were found in +strolling through the streets in threes and fours, singing at the top of +their voices comic songs, that often outraged propriety, ringing door +bells, and chaffing the police. Dickens must often in his reporting days +have witnessed the next morning appearances of these young men at Bow +Street police-court. + +The first appearance of two specimens of this variety of the immature +medico in the humorous pages of the "Pickwick Papers" is described as +follows in the low cockney vernacular of Sam Weller. "One on 'em," he +tells Mr. Pickwick, "has got his legs on the table, and is a-drinkin' +brandy neat, vile the tother one--him in the barnacles--has got a barrel +of oysters atween his knees, vich he's a-openin' like steam, and as fast +as he eats 'em he takes a aim with the shells at young Dropsy, who's +a-sittin' down fast asleep in the chimbley corner." The latter gentleman +is Mr. Benjamin Allen, who is described by the novelist as "a coarse, +stout, thick-set young man, with black hair cut rather short, and a white +face cut rather long. He was embellished with spectacles, and wore a white +neckerchief. Below his single-breasted black surtout, which was buttoned +up to his chin, appeared the usual number of pepper-and-salt coloured +legs, terminating in a pair of imperfectly polished boots. Although his +coat was short in the sleeves, it disclosed no vestige of a linen +wristband, and although there was quite enough of his face to admit of the +encroachment of a shirt-collar, it was not graced by the smallest approach +to that appendage. He presented altogether rather a mildewy appearance, +and emitted a fragrant odour of full-flavoured Cubas." + +This gentleman's companion is Mr. Bob Sawyer, "who was habited in a coarse +blue coat which, without being either a great-coat or a surtout, partook +of the nature and qualities of both," and "had about him that sort of +slovenly smartness and swaggering gait which is peculiar to young +gentlemen who smoke in the streets by day, shout and scream in the same by +night, call waiters by their Christian names, and do various other acts +and deeds of an equally facetious description. He wore a pair of plaid +trousers and a large rough double-breasted waistcoat: out of doors he +carried a thick stick with a big top. He eschewed gloves, and looked, upon +the whole, something like a dissipated Robinson Crusoe." The conversation +of these budding surgeons is perfectly in harmony with their outward +aspect. Their discourse, when it assumes a serious character, is of the +"cases" at the hospital and the "subjects" at the time being on the +dissecting tables of the anatomical lecture-rooms. When relieved from +attendance at the hospitals, they lounge at tavern bars, and flirt with +barmaids and waitresses, to whom their attentions are not unfrequently of +an objectionable character, and less agreeable than they imagine them to +be. + +The contrast between the graphic power displayed by Dickens in his +delineation of the characters of Bob Sawyer and Ben Allen, and the +indistinctiveness, as to profession, of his presentments of Allan +Woodcourt and Dr. Jeddler, may help us to understand the causes which +render his doctors so much less effective than his lawyers. The legal +profession presents more variety than the medical, and comes before us +more prominently in conjunction with incidents of a striking character, as +may be seen every day in the newspaper records of the courts of law and of +police. The physician and the surgeon stand as much apart, in these +respects, from the busy barrister or solicitor as the clergy do. Dickens +has not given us a clerical portrait, and probably for a similar reason. +Mrs. Oliphant, on the other hand, excels in her delineations of every +grade of the Anglican hierarchy; but her genius as a writer of fiction +runs in a groove essentially different from that of Dickens. + + + + +Famous Literary Doctors. + +BY CUMING WALTERS. + + +Medical men have not so commonly made literature an extra pursuit, or +adopted it as a serious calling, as have the members of the other liberal +professions. It is quite expected that a clergyman should write poems, +philosophical essays, and perhaps even a novel with a purpose; and it is +usual to recruit the ranks of critics extensively from the law, and to +trust to briefless barristers for a continuous supply of romances. No +detail is more frequently discovered in the biographies of eminent authors +than that they were called to the Bar, and either never practised or +forsook practising in order to engage in literary labours. Indeed, it +might almost seem that failure in law was the most important step towards +success in authorship. No such rule applies, however, to medical men, and +no such comment would be justified in their case. Not only do we find the +writing of books--otherwise than text-books and technical +treatises--rarer with them, but it curiously happens that in most +instances it has been the successful practitioner, not the man walking the +hospitals or waiting for calls, who has turned author. And we shall find +that these medico-literati (if I may coin the phrase) have often been +among the most hard-working in their profession, and the wonder is that +they were able to enter upon a second pursuit and to follow it with so +much zeal. For, in most of the examples I shall advance, literature was +more than a pastime with these men who indulged in it. It was chosen by +some for its lucrativeness, and by the majority for its capacity to +enhance their reputation or to bring them enduring fame. This much may be +safely said, that the names of many excellent doctors would have faded +from public remembrance ere this, and would have passed away with the +generation to which they belonged, had not literature given them lasting +luminance. In not a few instances the fact is already forgotten or wholly +ignored that certain successful writers once wrote "M.D." after their +names. Who cares that the author of that classic "Religio Medici" took his +degrees at Leyden and at Oxford, and dispensed medicine to the end of his +life? Who cares that the author of "The Borough," "Tales in Verse," and +"The Parish Register," was apprenticed to a surgeon? Who cares that the +writer of such dramas as "Virginius," "William Tell," and "The Hunchback," +was trained for a physician? Who cares that the author of "Roderick +Random," "Peregrine Pickle," and "The Expedition of Humphrey Clinker" was +a surgeon's assistant and acted as surgeon's mate in the unfortunate +Carthagena expedition, before trying (unsuccessfully) to obtain a practice +in London? And, above all, who cares that the author of "The Deserted +Village" and "The Vicar of Wakefield" studied physic in Edinburgh and on +the Continent, and, as Boswell was informed, "was enabled to pursue his +travels on foot, partly by demanding at Universities to enter the lists as +a disputant, by which, according to the custom of many of them, he was +entitled to the premium of a crown, when luckily for him his challenge was +not accepted?" Such are a few of the examples which immediately occur to +the mind when the whole subject is contemplated. + +It would be impossible in the compass of a short article to deal +systematically and comprehensively with doctors who became authors, or to +make out a complete list of their names with an account of the works which +entitled them to the designation. Any facts now adduced must be considered +arbitrary and capricious, so far as the choice of them is concerned; and +sequence is so little attempted that the reader will pardon, I trust, a +possible leap from Galen to Goldsmith, from Sir Thomas Browne to Tobias +Smollett, and from Sir John Blackmore to Conan Doyle. I put aside those +members of the profession who have simply written on professional +subjects. Their name is legion, but in the great majority of cases such +work as this would not strictly justify their inclusion among the +literati. And, on the other hand, we cannot find a place in the category +for such men as Goethe or Sainte-Beuve, for though both studied +medicine, it seems to have been purely with a view to the extension of +their knowledge and not with any more practical or material object. +Sainte-Beuve, it is true, for a short time in his youth entertained some +thought of adopting the profession; but Goethe only dipped into the +subject with the same spirit that he dipped into experimental chemistry +and astrology. + +Let us, then, refer to a few types certain of instant recognition. The +most notable of modern instances is Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, a +specialist in his profession, a hard-working physician, and the author of +valuable treatises on medical art, who nevertheless occupied the position +of being among the four chief poets whom America has produced, and one of +the most versatile of the litterateurs of the century. He went to the +Paris Medical Schools shortly after he had graduated at Harvard; he +practised as a physician at Boston; and for nearly forty years he was +Professor of Physiology. Yet he had time to write the most delightful and +original of philosophical essays, to publish novels of which at least +one--"Elsie Venner: A Romance of Destiny"--will rank as a classic; to +deliver orations and after-dinner speeches in sparkling verse, and to +write exquisite poems in rich and felicitous language on a wonderful +variety of themes, the complete collection of which makes a very +substantial volume. In all his work Dr. Holmes showed himself to be the +profound student of nature and of humanity with many varying interests; +yet we can often trace the hand of the physician in the work of the +essayist and poet. His novels were special studies which only the ardent +physiologist and metaphysician would have cared to discuss, or, at all +events, would have discussed so well. Both "Elsie Venner" and "The +Guardian Angel" deal with the occult problems of heredity, and those +problems are treated with the power of the specialist in certain branches +of science. Still more strongly is the character of the medical man +displayed in a number of the poems, some by reason of their subject, and +some by the figures and imagery they contain. The well-known "Stethoscope +Song" will immediately suggest itself in illustration. But, for purposes +of quotation, I prefer a less popular poem of rare beauty, which more +strikingly manifests the writer's power of transmuting the hard dry facts +of science into light and gleaming poetry. I refer to what he called at +first "The Anatomist's Hymn," but afterwards "The Living Temple." It is +one of the interpolated poems in the "Autocrat" series of papers, and to +my thinking invests the human body and its physical functions with +unimagined charms. + +Take, for instance, this poetic exposition of our respiration, the +scientific correctness and exactness of which need no explanation to +readers of this volume:-- + + "The smooth, soft air with pulse-like waves + Flows murmuring through its hidden caves, + Whose streams of brightening purple rush + Fired with a new and livelier blush, + While all their burden of decay + The ebbing current steals away, + And red with Nature's flame they start + From the warm fountains of the heart. + + No rest that throbbing slave may ask, + For ever quivering o'er his task, + While far and wide a crimson jet + Leaps forth to fill the woven net + Which in unnumbered crossing tides + The flood of burning life divides, + Then kindling each decaying part + Creeps back to find the throbbing heart. + + But warmed with that unchanging flame + Behold the outward moving frame, + Its living marbles jointed strong + With glistening band and silvery thong, + And linked to reason's guiding reins + By myriad rings in trembling chains, + Each graven with the threaded zone + Which claims it as the master's own." + +There is an almost irresistible temptation to linger over Dr. Oliver +Wendell Holmes' books, so intensely interesting is his personality and so +fascinating is his work. But several other eminent poets of the +profession demand attention. To Crabbe's connection with surgery I have +already incidentally referred, and inasmuch as he early abandoned the +calling for the ministry, little need be said except that his youthful +experience may have aided him in writing a scathing denunciation of the +Quack, who believed wholly in the potence of "oxymel of squills," and of +the Parish Doctor, who "first insults the victim whom he kills." The poet +was a severe castigator, and was never less forbearing with the lash than +when these impostors of his day were under his hand for flagellation. In +Mark Akenside we come to a better specimen of the class which we are +considering. At the age of twenty he went to Leyden, and three years later +became, (as Dr. Johnson writes) "a doctor of physick, having, according to +the custom of the Dutch Universities, published a thesis." In the same +year he published "The Pleasures of the Imagination," his greatest work. +This was followed by a collection of odes, but he still sought a +livelihood as a physician. Little success attended him, however, and Dr. +Johnson records that Akenside was known as a poet better than as a doctor, +and would have been reduced to great exigencies but for the generosity of +an ardent friend. "Thus supported, he gradually advanced in medical +reputation, but never attained any great extent of practice, or eminence +of popularity. A physician in a great city," his biographer continues +musingly, "seems to be the mere play-thing of Fortune; his degree of +reputation is, for the most part, totally casual; they that employ him, +know not his excellence; they that reject him, know not his deficiency." +Yet it was otherwise with Sir Samuel Garth, doctor and poet, of whom +Johnson himself records that "by his conversation and accomplishments he +obtained a very extensive practice." His principal poem was "The +Dispensary," relating to a controversy of the time between the College of +Physicians, who desired to give gratuitous advice to the poor, and the +Apothecaries, who wished to keep up the high price of medicine. Garth was +"on the side of charity against the intrigues of interest, and of regular +learning against licentious usurpation of medical authority," as Johnson +put it; and he sprang into favour, was eventually knighted, and became +physician-general to the army. His last literary work, and his worst, was +a crude but ostentatious preface to a translation of Ovid. As a matter of +fact his writing was invariably mediocre, and Pope, in calling attention +to the fact that the "Dispensary" poem had been corrected in every +edition, unkindly remarked that "every change was an improvement." John +Phillips, who may be ranked among the physicians, though it is doubtful +whether he practised, enjoyed a better fate as a man of letters than did +either Akenside or Garth. He sprang into sudden popularity by the +publication of a whimsical and clever medley called "The Silver Shilling," +and this he followed up by a sort of official commemoration of the victory +of Blenheim. His greatest achievement was a poem in two books on "Cider," +and he was meditating an epic on "The Last Day" when he died, at the early +age of thirty-three. One curious fact about his writings, small as it is, +is worthy of mention. He sang the praises of tobacco in every poem he +wrote, except that on Blenheim. + +Dr. Johnson did not rate Phillips very highly; he said that what study +could confer he obtained, but that "natural deficience cannot be +supplied." The sturdy doctor, however, did his utmost to rehabilitate the +damaged reputation of Blackmore, whom we may regard as the most +remarkable of all the compounds of physician-poets with whom we can become +acquainted. Blackmore obtained an undeserved success, which was followed +by unmerited ridicule, and Johnson, who hated every form of injustice, +constituted himself his champion. For the truth about Blackmore we must +seek the medium between the extremes of Johnson's praise and of the +censure of his enemies--the "malignity of contemporary wits," as Boswell +termed it. When all is said and done the fact remains that Blackmore was a +man of uncommon character, and a prodigious worker. His first work, a +heroic poem in ten books, on Prince Arthur, was written, he related, by +"such catches and starts, and in such occasional uncertain hours as his +profession afforded, and for the greatest part in coffee-houses, or in +passing up and down the streets." This work passed through several +editions with rapidity, and two extra books were added to it. The King +knighted him and gave him other advances, but the critics furiously +assailed him, and his name became a by-word for all that was heavy and +ridiculous in poetry. Notwithstanding this he persevered, and published +successively a "Paraphrase on the Book of Job," a "Satire on Wit," +"Elijah,"--an epic poem in ten books--"Creation, a Philosophical Poem," +"Advice to Poets how to celebrate the Duke of Marlborough," "The Nature of +Man," "Redemption," "A New Version of the Psalms," "Alfred"--an epic in +twelve books--"A History of the Conspiracy against King William," and a +host of others which his perverted reason or fantastic fancy suggested. +Never, perhaps, was known such a voluminous author, or one so erratic in +his system. What with his long heroic poems, his treatises on smallpox and +other diseases, his theological controversies, his "Advices" to painters, +poets, and weavers, and his prose contributions to periodical +publications, "England's Arch-Poet" (as Swift described him) could never +have idled away an hour. Of all that he wrote, a few passages from his +"Arthur" and "Creation" are alone remembered, and but for Johnson's +good-natured attempt to save him from oblivion, his name would only have +lived in the satires of his remorseless critics. One saying of Blackmore's +only is worth noting here. He had laid himself open to the imputation of +despising learning, and Dr. Johnson himself thought him a shallow ill-read +man. But Blackmore said:--"I only undervalued false or superficial +learning, that signifies nothing for the service of mankind; as to physic +I expressly affirmed that learning must be joined with native genius to +make a physician of the first rank; but if those talents are separated, I +asserted, and do still insist, that a man of native sagacity and diligence +will prove a more able and useful practiser than a heavy notional scholar +encumbered with a heap of confused ideas." + +One or two other doctors who in their time enjoyed a reputation as +writers, but whose fame was transient, or, at least, is insecure, call for +very brief notice before we pass on to a few of greater importance. Sir +John Hill, M.D., an eighteenth century physician, was a fairly extensive +litterateur, and in addition to producing treatises on botany, medicine, +natural history, and philosophy, wrote half a dozen novels, and several +dramas. His _chef d'oeuvre_ was "The Vegetable System," a work of such +magnitude that it ran to twenty-six volumes, a copy of which was presented +to the King of Sweden, and procured for the author the distinction of +being included in the Order of the Polar Star. Dr. William Fullarton +Cumming, a son of Burns' "Bonnie Leslie," was compelled to travel in mild +climates for his health, and as a result wrote "The Notes of a Wanderer," +a work abounding in poetic descriptions of the charming scenery of the +East. He tells us that the real pleasure of travelling is not to boast of +how many lions one may have slain in a single day, but to saunter about +without an object, to inhale the moral atmosphere of places visited, to +enter bazaars, not to buy, but to catch the hundred peculiarities of a new +people, to stray hither and thither watching the work and the recreations +of other races. John Chalmers, M.D. (not to be confused with the great +divine, Dr. Thomas Chalmers), also deserves to be noted as a very graceful +writer of romantic stories; and Sir Henry Thompson, under the name of "Pen +Oliver," produced some years ago a strange little volume which enjoyed a +season's success--"Charley Kingston's Aunt." + +That most diffident and most delightful of authors, Dr. John Brown, who +gave us the memorable "Rab and his Friends," was in practice at Edinburgh. +As long as lovers of the animal creation are to be found, the story of Rab +and of Marjorie will be read; and these sketches of brutes whom he almost +humanised will probably outlive the genial doctor's more ambitious "Horae +Subsecivae" and "John Leech and other Papers." Of a very different nature +was the author of "Ten Thousand a Year," Dr. Samuel Warren, physician, +lawyer, politician, novelist, and office-seeker. Tittlebat Titmouse is not +much studied now, for the type is out-of-date, and the society of which +the novel treats, the abuses prevalent, the general corruption which +prevailed in public life, were exposures intended for a past generation. +Yet there are passages in the work which should save it from absolute +neglect, and it has for over half a century kept its author's name alive. +This is more than his "Passages from the Diary of a late Physician" could +have done, or those dozen other works with the bare titles of which the +present reading public is scarcely acquainted. John Abercrombie, the chief +consulting physician in Scotland during the last century, sought and +achieved literary fame with two volumes on "The Intellectual Powers," and +"The Moral Feelings." They enjoyed a popularity scarcely commensurate with +their actual merits. + +David Macbeth Moir, who faithfully performed the arduous duties of a +medical practitioner in Edinburgh, and whose life was almost wholly +devoted to the service of his fellows, was the famous "Delta" of +_Blackwood's Magazine_. His poems, some four hundred of which he +contributed to "Maga." alone, are out of fashion now, though their +delightful vein of reflectiveness and their charm of expression should +preserve them from absolute neglect. The heavy labours of his profession +did not seem to check his literary productiveness. His poems fill two +large volumes; his prose works are by no means meagre or unimportant, and +his "Sketches of the Poetical Literature of the past Half-century," is a +standard work on the poetry of his period. Medical treatises, too, came +from his pen; and his "Life of Mansie Wauch, Tailor," is one of the most +agreeable of genuine Scotch sketches. His biographer correctly summed up +the merits of the worthy doctor as a literary worker in the words "Good +sound sense, a simple healthy feeling, excited and exalted though these +may be, never fail him. He draws from nature, and from himself direct." +Quiet humour and simple pathos, a love of humanity, deep reverential +feeling, and originality of thought--all these are found in "Delta's" +writings, and serve, with his own admirable nature, to keep his memory +green. + +Of Dr. Conan Doyle, the most conspicuous instance of the hour of the +doctor turned author, no detailed notice is requisite, as the main facts +of his career are sufficiently well known, and his literary work promises +to bring him both fame and fortune. Undoubtedly he exemplifies the fact +that the medical hand can scarcely be concealed when it takes to the pen, +for his novels and stories abound in allusions which only his study, +training, and experience as a doctor could suggest. His reading and +observation largely provide the technique of his romances. Something of +the same could be said of Smollett's work, though the medical knowledge of +the author was often turned to less agreeable account. In fact, most of +Smollet's references on this score were the reverse of delectable, and I +refrain from a more precise examination of them. The unexpected use to +which Mr. R. D. Blackmore has turned his knowledge of medicine--for he +studied medicine as well as law seriously in his youth--in several of his +novels, notably in the last, "Perlycross," has excited much interest and +attention among the profession. So marked is this that I cannot refrain +quoting from a singularly interesting criticism penned by a leading +physician in the Midlands. "The medical incidents in 'Perlycross,'" he +says, "are pourtrayed with an accuracy which shows an intimate knowledge +of the profession and its members.... No doubt the opinions expressed by +one learned doctor were those of the time represented in the story, though +they could hardly be received with justice in the present day. Speaking of +the illness of Sir Thomas Waldron, he says (p. 18):--'At present such a +case could be dealt with best in Paris, although we have young men rising +now who will make it otherwise before very long.' The key to this +difficulty is found later on (p. 159) where the technical word +'introsusception' is mentioned as the disease or condition from which the +patient suffered. At the time spoken of Parisian surgeons, headed by the +eminent Dupuytren, excelled in the art of surgery; at the present time +such a case could be treated as well by any hospital surgeon in England as +in the metropolis of France.... The book contains an admirably-described +case of catalepsy, which is equally well explained. The cure of the +attack is described with consummate skill and power. The keystone of the +whole position of medical knowledge is contained in a few words towards +its close. In these days of rapid transition from one excitement to +another it would be well to take the lesson to heart, and to remember what +the author speaks of as two fine things--'If you wish to be sure of +anything see it with your own good eyes,' and the second, 'Never scamp +your work.' How these sayings may be applied in the practice of the +profession may with profit be learned from a perusal of the pages of +'Perlycross.'" Perhaps I am going too far in claiming Mr. Blackmore as a +medical man who has taken to literature, but the excuse of his early +training, combined with this curious result of it manifested in his +writing, proves irresistible. + +Not to stray, however, but to get our feet once more upon solid ground, we +may refer to a classic example, with which this article, had it been aught +else but discursive, should have begun. Galen, the Greek physician, must +be counted among the first and most famous of his class who have written +literary works. He was so voluminous a writer on philosophical subjects +that scores of books on logic and ethics have been fathered upon him +without much question arising as to the unlikelihood of his being the +author of so many. As it is he is credited with eighty-three treatises, +the genuineness of which is not disputed; there are nineteen suspected to +bear his name unjustly, forty-five are proved to be spurious, and then +there remain a further fifteen fragments and fifteen commentaries on +Hippocrates, which may be accepted as his in part or whole. He made +himself master of the medical, physiological, and scientific knowledge of +his time. He was born in 130 A.D., and died in 201, and left a record of +that period. In addition to preparing this massive work, he seems to have +found time to devote himself to various branches of philosophy with such +success that later writers were well pleased to trade with the talisman of +his name. Were it worth while to go back to antiquity, and to the history +of foreign nations for further examples of physicians whose writings were +not confined to expositions of the medical system, Averrhoes, most famous +of Arabian philosophers, and physician to the calif, a master of the +twelfth century, would occupy a prominent position. But it is more to our +purpose to draw attention to the remarkable career, and one that deserves +to be held in remembrance, of Arthur Johnston, physician to King Charles +the First. In the same year that he graduated at the university of Padua +(1610) he was "laureated poet at Paris, and that most deservedly," as Sir +Thomas Urquhart recorded. He was then only three-and-twenty years of age, +and the prospect of many years being before him, he indulged in extensive +travel, and visited in turn most of the principal foreign seats of +learning. His journeying over, he settled in France and became equally +well known as a physician and as a writer of excellent Latin verse. A +courteous act, characteristic of the time, secured him the favour and +patronage of the English royal family, for in 1645 he published an elegy +on James I., and followed this up by dedicating a Latin rendering of the +Song of Solomon to King Charles. Other specimens of his rare culture and +his poetical powers were forthcoming, and he achieved a European +reputation. His Latin translation of the Psalms is held to be unexcelled +by any other, unless it be Buchanan's, and the fact that his translation +is still in use sufficiently attests its excellence and value. He died +suddenly in 1641, while on a visit to Oxford, and in the centuries which +have succeeded he has not been displaced in the front rank of refined and +deeply versed Latin scholars and poets. + +It would be a matter of considerable difficulty to make a complete list of +literary doctors, but enough has perhaps been written to show that they +are no small band so far as numbers go, and that their influence in the +world of books has been very considerable and distinguished. We owe to +them many great works of enduring repute, of value to the student, of +perpetual entertainment to the general reader. When, too, we consider the +willingness and the zeal with which the writing members of the medical +profession have imparted their knowledge, we are led to believe that they +accepted as their motto the noble utterance of Sir Thomas Browne, the +chief of literary doctors:--"To be reserved and caitiff in goodness is the +sordidest piece of covetousness, and more contemptible than pecuniary +Avarice. To this (as calling myself a Scholar) I am obliged by the duty of +my condition: I make not therefore my head a grave, but a treasure of +knowledge; I intend no Monopoly, but a community, in learning; I study +not for my own sake only, but for theirs that study not for themselves. I +envy no man that knows more than myself, but pity them that know less. I +instruct no man as an exercise of my knowledge, or with an intent rather +to nourish and keep it alive in mine own head than beget and propagate it +in his; and in the midst of all my endeavours there is but one thought +that dejects me, that my acquired parts must perish with myself, nor can +be Legacied among my honoured Friends." + + + + +The "Doctor" in time of Pestilence. + +BY WILLIAM E. A. AXON, F.R.S.L. + + "I do not feel in me those sordid and unchristian desires of my + profession; I do not secretly implore and wish for Plagues, rejoice at + Famines, revolve Ephemerides and Almanacks in expectation of malignant + Aspects, fatal Conjunctions, and Eclipses."--SIR THOMAS BROWNE'S + "Religio Medici," pt. ii., sec. ix. + + +Of the great epidemics which have from time to time devastated Europe, +Great Britain has had its full share. Between 664 and 1665 there were many +visitations, resulting in heavy mortality, to which the general name of +plague or pestilence has been given, although they were not always +identical in form. Often the dread sisters Famine and Pestilence went hand +in hand in the domains of merrie England in the good old times. + +The Statute of Labourers declares, no doubt with perfect truth, that "a +great part of the people, principally of artisans and labourers," died in +the pestilence known as the Black Death of 1349, which had important +consequences, socially and politically. There were many subsequent +outbreaks, though they fortunately did not attain to the enormous +proportions of the great mortality. We have from the graphic hand of +Chaucer a life-like portrait of a medical man of the fourteenth century +who had gained his money in the time of pestilence. + +At the end of the fifteenth and middle of the sixteenth century, we have +as alternating with bubo plague, the _Sudor Anglicanus_. Its appearance +coincided with the invasion by which Richard III. lost his crown, and his +rival became Henry VII. Dr. Thomas Forrester, who was in London during the +outbreak of 1485, gives instances of suddenness with which the "sweat" +became fatal. "We saw two prestys standing togeder and speaking togeder, +and we saw both of them die suddenly." The symptoms were sweating, bad +odour, redness, thirst, headache, "and some had black spots as it appeared +in our frere Alban, a noble leech, on whose soul God have mercy." +Forrester complains of the quacks who put letters on poles and on church +doors, promising to help the people in their need. He lays stress upon +astrological causes, but does not overlook the defective sanitation which +gave the plague some of its firm hold. The _Sudor Anglicanus_ returned in +1508, 1517, 1528, and 1551. The last visitation was the occasion of a +treatise by the worthy Cambridge founder, to whom Gonville and Caius +College owes so much. + +"The Boke of Jhon Caius aganst the sweatyng Sickness" is an interesting +document. It opens with a long autobiographical passage as to his previous +literary labours, which have ranged from medicine to theology. At first he +wrote in English, but afterwards in Latin and Greek. The reason for this +change is stated. "Sence y{t} that tyme diverse other thynges I have +written, but with the entente never more to write in the Englishe tongue +partly because the comodite of that which is so written, passeth not the +compasse of Englande, but remaineth enclosed within the seas, and partly +because I thought that labours so taken should be halfe lost among them +which set not by learnyng. Thirdly, for that I thought it best to auoide +the judgment of the multitude from whom in maters of lernyng a man shal be +forced to dissente, in disprouyng that which they most approue, and +approuyng that which they most disalowe. Fourthly for that the common +settyng furthe and printig of every foolishe thyng in englishe, both of +phisicke vnperfectly and other matters vndiscretly diminishe the grace of +thynges learned set furth in thesame. But chiefely because I would geve +none example or comfort to my countrie men (who I would to be now, as here +tofore they have been, comparable in learnyng to men of other countries) +to stande onely in the Englishe tongue, but to leaue the simplicitie of +the same, and to procede further in many and diuerse knowledges both in +tongues and sciences at home and in uniuersities, to the adornyng of the +comon welthe, better service of their kyng, and great pleasure and +commodite of their own selues, to what kind of life so euer they should +applie them." But his resolution not to write again in the vulgar tongue +was broken by considerations of utility, for he saw that it could not be +very serviceable to ordinary English people to give them advice as to the +treatment of the sweating sickness in a language which they did not +understand. In his account of this dire malady, he lays stress upon errors +and excess of diet as a strongly co-operating cause. "They which had thys +sweat sore with perille or death, were either men of welthe, ease and +welfare, or of the poorer sorte such as wer idls persones, good ale +drinkers, and Tauerne haunters. For these, by ye great welfare of the one +sorte, and large drinkyng of thother, heped up in their bodies moche evill +matter: by their ease and idlenes, coulde not waste and consume it." +Against the infection of bad air he recommends avoiding carrion "kepyng +Canelles cleane" and other general sanitary precautions. He suggests that +the midsummer bonfires were intended for purging the air, "and not onely +for vigils." Rosewater and other perfumes are to be used, and he thinks it +would be well to clear the house of its rushes and dust. It is to be +feared that the rushes which served instead of carpets, even in great +houses, were not renewed very frequently. The handkerchief was to be +perfumed, and the patient was to have in his mouth "a pece either of +setwel, or of the rote of _enula campana_ wel steped before in vinegre +rosate, a mace, or berie of Juniper." + +Dr. Caius, like Dr. Forrester, did not omit to warn his readers that even +with the aid of his book a medical man was still necessary, and in doing +so he gives us a glimpse of the quack doctors of the sixteenth century. +"Therefore seke you out a good Phisicien, and knowen to haue skille, and +at the leaste be so good to your bodies, as you are to your hosen or shoes +for the wel-making or mending wherof, I doubt not but you wil diligently +searche out who is knowe to be the best hosier or shoemaker in the place +where you dwelle: and flie the unlearned as a pestilence to the comune +wealth. As simple women, carpenters, pewterers, brasiers, sope ball +sellers, pulters, hostellers, painters, apotecaries (otherwise then for +their drogges), auaunters theselves to come from Pole, Constantiple, +Italie, Almaine, Spaine, Fraunce, Grece, and Turkie, Inde, Egipt or Jury: +from y{e} seruice of Emperoures, kinges, and quienes, promisig helpe of al +diseases, yea vncurable, with one or two drinckes, by waters sixe monethes +in continualle distillinge, by _Aurum potabile_, or _quintessence_, by +drynckes of great and hygh prices as though thei were made of the sune, +moone, or sterres, by blessynges, and Blowinges, Hipocriticalle prayenges, +and foolysh smokynges of shirts, smockes, and kerchieffes, wyth such other +theire phantasies and mockeries, meaninge nothng els, but to abuse your +light belieue, and scorne you behind your backes with their medicines, so +filthie, that I am ashamed to name theim, for your single wit and simple +belief, in trusting the most which you know not at al, and vnderstad +least: like to them which thinke farre foules have faire fethers, although +thei be never so euil fauoured & foule: as though there could not be so +conning an Englishman, as a foolish running stranger (of others I speak +not) or so perfect helth by honest learning, as by deceiptfull ignorance." + +Dr. Caius laid stress upon exercise as an aid to health, but some popular +games he thought "rather a laming of legges than an exercise." We need not +follow him in the details of the treatment he recommends if in spite of +the adoption of his preventive _regime_, the sweating sickness should +come. + +In 1561 there was issued "A newe booke conteyninge an exortacion to the +sicke." The tract ends with the following parody on the nostrums current +for the cure of the pestilence: "Take a pond of good hard penaunce, and +washe it wel with the water of your eyes, and let it ly a good whyle at +youre hert. Take also of the best fyne fayth, hope, charyte yt you can +get, a like quantite of al mixed together, your soule even full, and use +this confection every day in your lyfe, whiles the plages of God +reigneth. Then, take both your handes ful of good workes commaunded of +God, and kepe them close in a clene conscience from the duste of vayne +glory, and ever as you are able and se necessite so to use them. This +medicine was found wryten in an olde byble boke, and it hath been +practised and proved true of mani, both men and women" (Collier's _Bib. +Account_, i. 74). + +The wealthy, on an outbreak of the plague, fled from the infected city, as +we may learn from Boccaccio, and from Miles Coverdale's translation of +Osiander's sermon, "How and whether a Christian man ought to flye the +horrible plage of the pestilence," which appeared in 1537. + +During the plague of London, in 1603, the physicians are asserted by +Dekker to have "hid their synodical heads," but this is at all events not +wholly true. Thomas Lodge, the poet, was also a graduate in medicine, and +in his "Treatise on the Plague"--not the only one published in relation to +this epidemic--we are told of his experiences of the plague-stricken city. +He gives some good advice in relation to the sanitary measures to be taken +for the prevention of the plague. + +The nature of the regulations devised in the Tudor times to ward off +infection may be gathered from the rules laid down at Chester in November, +1574, when + + "the right Worshipful Sir John Sauage, Knight, maior of the City of + Chester had consideracion of the present state of the said cite + somewhat visited with what is called the plage, and divisinge the best + meanes and orderlie waies he can, with [the advice] of his Bretheren + the alderman, Justices of peace within the citie aforesaid (through + the goodness of God) to avoid the same hath with such advice, sett + forth ordained and appointed (amongst other) the points, articles, + clauses, and orders folowing, which he willeth and commandeth all + persons to observe and kepe, upon the severall pains theirin + contayned: + + "Imprimis. That no person nor persons who are or shalbe visited with + the said sickness, or any other who shall be of there company, shall + go abrode out of there houses without license of the alderman of the + ward such persons inhabite, And that every person soe licensed to + beare openlie in their hands ... three quarters long ... ense ... + shall goe abrode out of the ... upon paine that eny person doynge the + contrary to be furthwith expulsed out of the said citie. + + "2. Item if any person doe company with any persons visited, they + alsoe to beare ... upon like payne. + + "3. Item that none of them soe visited doe goe abroad in any part or + place within the citie in the night season, upon like payne. + + "4. Item that the accustomed due watche to be kepte every night, + within the said citie, by the inhabitants thereof. + + "5. Item the same watchman to apprehend and take up all night walkers + and such suspect as shalbe founde within and to bring them to the + Justice of peace, of that ... the gaile of the Northgate, that further + order may be taken with them as shall appear.... + + "6. Item that no swine be kept, within the said citie nor any other + place, then ... side prively nor openlie after the xiii{th} daie of + this present moneth, upon paine of fyne and imprisonment of every + person doing the contrary. + + "7. Item that no donge, muck or filth, at any tyme, hearafter be caste + within the walls of the said citie, upon paine of ffyne and + imprisonment at his worships direction. + + "8. Item that no kind or sort of ... or any wares from other place be + brought in packs into the said citie of Chester, untill the same be + ffirste opened and eired without the libities of the said citie, upon + pain last recited. + + "9. Item that papers or writing containing this sence Lord haue mercie + upon us, to be fixed upon euery house, dore post, or other open place, + to the street of the house so infected. + + "10. Item that no person of the said citie doe suffer any their doggs + to goe abrode out of their houses or dwellings, upon paine that euery + such dogge so founde abrode shalbe presently killed. And the owners + thereof ponished at his worships pleasure." + +It has always been found easier to make laws than to have them enforced, +and we find certain inhabitants complaining of the disobedience of +infected persons in the following petition:-- + + "To the right worshipful Sir John Savage, knight, maior of the Citie + of Chester, the aldermen, sheriffs, and common counsaile of the same. + + "In most humble wise complayninge sheweth unto your worships, your + Orators, the persons whose name are subscribed inhabiting in a certain + lane within the same citie called Pepper Street, That where yt haue + pleased God to infect divers persons of the same Street with the + plage, and where also for the avoidinge of further infection your + worships have taken order that all such so infected should observe + certaine good necessarye orders by your worships made and provided. + But so it is, right worships, that none of the said persons infected + do observe any of the orders by your worships in that case taken, to + the greate danger and perill, not only of your Orators and their + famelyes being in number twenty, but also of the reste of the said + citie, who by the sufferance of God and of his gracious goodness are + clere and safe from any infection of the said deceas: In consideration + whereof your Orators moste humbly beseche your worships for God's + sake, and as your worships intend it your Orators should, by the + sufferance of God, avoide the dangers of the said deceas with their + family, and also for the better safty of the citie to take such + directions with the said infected persons that they may clearly be + avoided from thens to some other convenient for the time untill God + shall restore them to their former health. And in this doing your + Orators shall daily pray, &c."[1] + +During the visitation of the plague at Manchester in 1645, when the place +suffered severely, the authorities not only provided "cabins" at +Collyhurst for the reception of those whom the disease attacked, but +engaged the services of "Doctor Smith," who received L4 "for his charges +to London and a free guift," and L39 "for part of his wages for his +service in the time of the visitation." Thos. Minshull, the apothecary, +was paid L6 2s. 6d. for "stuffe for ye town's service." Some "bottles and +stuffe" were unused at the end of the plague, and these were sold to "Mr. +Smith, Phissition," for L1. + +The story of English pestilence closes with the Great Plague of London in +1665. It began about the west end of the city, Hampstead, Highgate, and +Acton sharing the infection, and gradually worked eastward by way of +Holborn. Out of an estimated population of 460,000 there died 97,306 +persons, of whom 68,596 perished of pestilence. One week witnessed 8,297 +deaths, and it has been seriously argued that the official figures very +much underrate the truth, and that in this week of highest mortality the +deaths really amounted to 12,000. "Almost all other diseases turned to the +plague." Many of the clergy fled, and the places of some were occupied by +the ejected Nonconformists. The complaint of absenteeism was also brought +against the physicians, but there were certainly some who stayed in the +infected and desolate city. "But Lord!" says Pepys, "what a sad time it is +to all: no boats upon the river, and grass grown all up and down Whitehall +Court, and nobody but poor wretches in the street." William Boghurst, who +was an apothecary, and Nathaniel Hodges, who was a physician, each wrote +full accounts of the plague. + +Hodges was the son of a vicar of Kensington, where he was born in 1629. He +was a King's scholar at Westminster, and was educated both at Cambridge +and Oxford, taking his M.D. degree at the latter university in 1659. When +the great plague broke out he remained at his house in Walbrook, and gave +advice to all who sought it. There was unfortunately no lack of patients. +Hodges' writings give us a minute account of the "doctor in the time of +pestilence." The first doubtful appearances of the plague were noticed by +Dr. Hodges amongst some of those who sought his counsel at the Christmas +of 1664-5, in May and June there were some that could not be mistaken, and +in August and September he was overwhelmed with work. He was an early +riser, and after taking a dose of anti-pestilential electuary, he attended +to any private business that needed immediate decision, and then went to +his consulting room, and for three hours received a succession of +patients, some already ill of the plague, others only infected by fear. +Having disposed of these anxious inquirers, the doctor breakfasted, and +then began his round of visits to patients who were unable to see him at +home. Disinfectants were burnt on hot coals as he entered their houses, +and he also took a lozenge. Returning home, he dined off roast meat and +pickles, prefaced and followed by sack and other wine. A second round of +visits did not terminate until eight or nine in the evening. He was an +enemy of tobacco, but his dislike of the Indian weed did not extend to +sack, which he seems to have drunk plentifully, especially perhaps on the +two occasions when he thought he had himself caught the plague. These +proved to be false alarms. Amongst the drugs he tried and found useless +were "unicorn's horn" and dried toads. The Corporation of London testified +a due sense of Hodges' services by a stipend and the position of physician +to the city. His "Loimologia" is an important contribution to the +literature of epidemics. + +Hodges, who had thus been a witness of the Carnival of Death in the +metropolis of England, may well have pondered on the words of one of his +illustrious contemporaries, Sir Thomas Browne, who says:--"I have not +those strait ligaments, or narrow obligations to the world as to dote on +life, or be convulst and tremble at the name of Death. Not that I am +insensible of the dread and horrour thereof; or by raking into the bowels +of the deceased, continual sight of anatomies, skeletons, or cadaverous +reliques, like vespilloes or grave makers, I am become stupid, or have +forgot the apprehension of mortality: but that, marshalling all the +horrors and contemplating the extremities thereof, I find not anything +therein able to daunt the courage of a man, much less a well resolved +Christian.... For a Pagan there may be some motive to be in love with +life; but for a Christian to be amazed at Death, I see not how he can +escape this dilemma, that he is too sensible of this life, or hopeless of +the life to come." + + + + +Mountebanks and Medicine. + +BY THOMAS FROST. + + +Mountebanks--a name derived from the Italian words _monta in banco_, +mounting a bench--were, in company with their attendant zanies, or "Merry +Andrews," a popular class of public entertainers down to the earlier years +of the present century. Their chief object, however, was not to provide a +free entertainment, but to dispose of their nostrums to the crowds which +the entertainment brought together. Andrew Borde, a medical practitioner +at Winchester, who obtained a more than local reputation, enjoying the +distinction of being one of the physicians of Henry VIII., is said to have +been the original "Merry Andrew." The story of his life is full of +interest, and furnishes some curious information concerning the manners of +his age and his class. Mr. George Roberts, who supplied Lord Macaulay with +much material for his "History of England," relates that Borde was a man +of great learning, and had travelled on the continent. He made many +astronomical calculations, which may not unfairly be supposed to have +been for the purposes of astrology. He was a celibitarian and an ascetic, +drinking water three times a week, wearing a hair-shirt next his skin, and +keeping the sheet intended for his burial at the foot of his bed. As a +mountebank, he frequented fairs, markets, and other places of public +resort, and addressed those assembled in recommendation of his medicines. +He was a fluent speaker, and the witticisms with which he interspersed his +lectures never failed to attract, obtaining for him the name of "Merry +Andrew." + +Mountebanks flourished on the continent as well as in England, and the +_Belphegor_ of the dramatist had many prototypes in Italy and France. +Coryat, a little-known writer, who made the tour of Europe at the +beginning of the seventeenth century, and published a narrative of his +adventures and experiences, gives a good account of the mountebanks he saw +at Venice. "Twice a day," he says, "that is, in the morning and afternoon, +you may see five or six several stages erected for them.... These +mountebanks at one end of their stage place their trunk, which is +replenished with a world of new-fangled trumperies. After the whole rabble +of them has gotten up to the stage,--whereof some wear vizards like fools +in a play, some that are women are attired with habits according to that +person they sustain,--the music begins; sometimes vocal, sometimes +instrumental, sometimes both. While the music plays, the principal +mountebank opens his trunk and sets abroad his wares. Then he maketh an +oration to the audience of half-an-hour long, wherein he doth most +hyperbolically extol the virtue of his drugs and confections--though many +of them are very counterfeit and false. I often wondered at these natural +orators, for they would tell their tales with such admirable volubility +and plausible grace, _extempore_, and seasoned with that singular variety +of elegant jests and witty conceits, that they did often strike great +admiration into strangers.... He then delivereth his commodities by little +and little, the jester still playing his part, and the musicians singing +and playing upon their instruments. The principal things that they sell +are oils, sovereign waters, amorous songs printed, apothecary drugs, and a +commonweal of other trifles. The head mountebank, every time he delivereth +out anything, maketh an extemporal speech, which he doth eftsoons +intermingle with such savoury jests (but spiced now and then with +singular scurrility), that they minister passing mirth and laughter to the +whole company, which may perhaps consist of a thousand people." The +entertainment extended over two hours, when, having sold as many of their +wares as they could, their properties would be removed and the stage taken +down. + +Jonson, in his comedy of "Volpone," presents a scene showing a +mountebank's stage at Venice, and the discourse of the vendor of quack +medicines has a remarkable resemblance to the oratory of the "Cheap Jacks" +of the present day, of which old play-goers may remember hearing a very +good imitation in the drama of "The Flowers of the Forest." Says Jonson's +mountebank: "You all know, honourable gentlemen, I never valued this +ampulla, or vial, at less than eight crowns; but for this time I am +content to be deprived of it for six: six crowns is the price, and less in +courtesy I know you cannot offer me. Take it or leave it, however, both it +and I am at your service! Well! I am in a humour at this time to make a +present of the small quantity my coffer contains: to the rich in courtesy, +and to the poor for God's sake. Wherefore, now mark: I asked you six +crowns, and six crowns at other times you have paid me; you shall not give +me six crowns, nor five, nor four, nor three, nor two, nor one, nor half a +ducat. Sixpence it will cost you (or six hundred pounds); expect no lower +price, for I will not bate." + +Returning to the mountebanks of our own country, we find in the accounts +of the Chamberlain of the Corporation of Worcester for the year 1631 the +following item:-- + + "They yeald account of money by them received of mountebanks to the + use of the poor 58s. 9d." + +It is suggested by Mr. John Noake, however, that these mountebanks were +riders or posturers, and that the amount was the charge made for the +permission accorded them to perform in the city. Later in the century, the +eccentric Earl of Rochester, on one occasion, played the mountebank on +Tower Hill, and the example was followed by more than one comedian of the +next century. Leveridge and Penkethman, actors well known at Bartholomew +Fair for many years, appeared at country fairs as "Doctor Leverigo and his +Jack-Pudding Pinkanello," as also did Haines as "Watho Van Claturbank, +High German Doctor." The discourse of the latter was published as a +broadside, headed with an engraving representing him addressing a crowd +from a stage, with a bottle of medicine in his right hand. Beside him +stands a Harlequin, and in the rear a man with a plumed hat blows a +trumpet. A gouty patient occupies a high-backed arm-chair, and an array of +boxes and bottles is seen at the back of the stage. + +"Having studied Galen, Hypocrates, Albumazar, and Paracelsus," says the +discourse thus headed, "I am now become the Esculapius of the age; having +been educated at twelve universities, and travelled through fifty-two +kingdoms, and been counsellor to the counsellors of several monarchs. By +the earnest prayers and entreaties of several lords, earls, dukes, and +honourable personages, I have been at last prevailed upon to oblige the +world with this notice, that all persons, young or old, blind or lame, +deaf and dumb, curable or incurable, may know where to repair for cure, in +all cephalalgias, paralytic paroxysms, palpitations of the pericardium, +empyemas, syncopes, and nasieties; arising either from a plethory or a +cachochymy, vertiginous vapours, hydrocephalus dysenteries, odontalgic or +podagrical inflammations, and the entire legion of lethiferous +distempers.... This is Nature's palladium, health's magazine; it works +seven manner of ways, as Nature requires, for it scorns to be confined to +any particular mode of operation; so that it affecteth the cure either +hypnotically, hydrotically, cathartically, poppismatically, pneumatically, +or synedochically; it mundifies the hypogastrium, extinguishes all +supernatural fermentations and ebullitions, and, in fine, annihilates all +nosotrophical morbific ideas of the whole corporeal compages. A drachm of +it is worth a bushel of March dust; for, if a man chance to have his +brains beat out, or his head dropped off, two drops--I say two drops! +gentlemen--seasonably applied, will recall the fleeting spirit, +re-enthrone the deposed archeus, cement the discontinuity of the parts, +and in six minutes restore the lifeless trunk to all its pristine +functions, vital, natural, and animal; so that this, believe me, +gentlemen, is the only sovereign remedy in the world. _Venienti occurite +morbo._--Down with your dust. _Principiis obsta._--No cure no money. +_Quaerendo pecunia primum._--Be not sick too late." + +The mountebanking quack flourished in great state in the first half of the +last century. "A Tour through England," published in 1723, gives the +following account of one whom the author saw at Winchester:--"As I was +sitting at the George Inn, I saw a coach with six bay horses, a calash and +four, a chaise and four, enter the inn, in a yellow livery, turned up with +red; four gentlemen on horseback, in blue, trimmed with silver: and as +yellow is the colour given by the dukes in England, I went out to see what +duke it was; but there was no coronet on the coach, only a plain +coat-of-arms on each, with this motto: ARGENTO LABORAT FABER. Upon +enquiry, I found this great equipage belonged to a mountebank, and that +his name being Smith, the motto was a pun upon his name. The footmen in +yellow were his tumblers and trumpeters, and those in blue his +merry-andrew, his apothecary, and his spokesman. He was dressed in black +velvet, and had in his coach a woman that danced on the ropes. He cures +all diseases, and sells his packets for sixpence a-piece. He erected +stages in all the market towns twenty miles round; and it is a prodigy how +so wise a people as the English are gulled by such pickpockets. But his +amusements on the stage are worth the sixpence, without the pills. In the +morning he is dressed up in a fine brocade night-gown, for his chamber +practice, when he gives advice, and gets large fees." + +A passage in a letter written by the second Lord Lyttelton, about the year +1774, shows that this style of travelling was then still kept up by +mountebanks. He says:--"As a family party of us were crossing the road on +the side of Hagley Park, a chaise passed along, followed by a couple of +attendants with French horns. Who can that be, said my father? Some +itinerant mountebank, replied I, if one may judge from his musical +followers. I really spoke with all the indifference of an innocent mind: +nor did it occur to me that the Right Reverend Father in God, my uncle, +had sometimes been pleased to travel with servants similarly accoutred." +Nearly twenty years later, the famous quack, Katerfelto, travelled through +Durham in a carriage, with a pair of horses, and attended by two negro +servants in green liveries, with red collars. In the towns he visited +these men were sent round to announce his lectures on electricity and the +microscope, blowing trumpets, and distributing hand-bills. + +There seems to be good ground for believing that among what may be called +the amateur mountebanks, such as Rochester, we must count the author of +"Tristram Shandy." Dr. Dibdin found in the possession of Mr. James +Atkinson, a medical practitioner at York, a rather roughly executed +picture, in oil colours, representing a mountebank and his zany on a +stage, surrounded by a crowd. An inscription described the former as Mr. +T. Brydges, and the latter as the Rev. Laurence Sterne. Mr. Atkinson, who +was an octogenarian, told Dr. Dibdin that his father had been acquainted +with Sterne, who was a good amateur draughtsman, and that he and Brydges +each painted the other's portrait in the picture. The story is a strange +one, but before it is dismissed as unworthy of belief, it must be +remembered that the clerical story-writer was a droll and whimsical +character, and at no time much influenced by his priestly vocation. It is +quite conceivable, therefore, that he may have indulged in such a freak on +some occasion during the period of his life in which he developed his +worst moral deficiencies. + +In the early years of the present century, a German quack, named Bossy, +used to mount a stage on Tower Hill and Covent Garden Market alternately, +in order, as he said, that both ends of London might profit by his +experience and skill. It is said that on one of these occasions, when he +had induced an old woman to mount his stage in the latter place, and +relate the wonderful cures the doctor had performed upon her, a parrot +that had learned some coarse language from the porters and costermongers +frequenting the market, and sometimes used it in a manner that seemed very +apt to the occasion, exclaimed, "Lying old ----!" when the old woman +concluded her narrative. The roar of laughter with which this criticism +was received by the rough audience disconcerted Bossy for a moment; but +quickly recovering his presence of mind, he stepped forward, with his hand +on his heart, and gravely replied, "It is no lie, you wicked bird!--it is +all true as is de Gospel!" Bossy attained considerable reputation, and +ended his days with a fair competence. + +The mountebank has long fallen from his former high estate. The quack may +still be found vending his pills in the open-air markets of Yorkshire and +Lancashire; but he does not mount a stage, and resembles his predecessors +of the last century only in the fluency and volubility of his discourse on +the virtues of his potions, pills, and plasters. The author of the paper +on mountebanks in the "Book of Days" (edited by Robert Chambers), states +that he saw one at York about 1860, who "sold medicines on a stage in the +old style, but without the Merry Andrew or the music," and adds that "he +presented himself in shabby black clothes, with a dirty white neck-cloth." +Even the name had long before that time ceased to be connected with the +vending of medicines, and had come to be applied to those itinerant circus +companies who gave gratuitous performances in the open air, making their +gains by the sale of lottery tickets. The present writer remembers seeing +the circus company of John Clarke performing on a piece of waste ground at +Lower Norwood, when the clown of the show went among the spectators +selling tickets at a shilling each, entitling the holder to participate in +a drawing, the prizes in which were Britannia metal tea pots and milk +ewers, papier mache tea trays, cotton gown pieces, etc. That must have +been about 1835, or within a year or two of that time. + +Only a few years later, a lottery in sixpenny shares was similarly +conducted at Alfreton, in Derbyshire, and probably in many other places, +though contrary to the provisions of the Lottery Act. + +The mountebank doctor of former times, with his carriage, his zany, and +his musicians, can now only be met with in the provincial towns of France +and Italy, and even there but seldom. Thirty or forty years ago, there was +a man who, in a carriage drawn up behind the Louvre, used to practise +dentistry and advertise his father, who had a flourishing dentist's +practice in one of the narrow streets near the cathedral of Notre Dame. +Another of this fraternity was seen at Marseilles by an English tourist a +few years later, and in this instance some musicians accompanied the +mountebank's phaeton, and drowned the cries of the suffering patients with +the crash of a march. But these survivals remind us rather of _Belphegor_, +in the pathetic drama of that name, than of _Dulcamara_ in the opera of +_L'Elisor d'Amore_, with his gorgeous equipage and his musical attendants, +as old play-goers remember the personation of the character by the famous +Lablache. + + + + +The Strange Story of the Fight with the Small-Pox. + +BY THOMAS FROST. + + +When, at the present day, we hear of an epidemic of small-pox in some town +where the practice of vaccine inoculation has been neglected, it is both +instructive and consolatory to turn our thoughts back to the time, before +the introduction of that practice, when that horrible disease caused ten +per cent, of all the deaths in excess of those occurring in the ordinary +course of nature. This statement, startling as it may seem to the present +generation, may be verified by reference to the annual bills of mortality +of the city of London. This fearful state of things had prevailed in +England from the time of the Plantagenets, when, in the first quarter of +the eighteenth century, a gleam of light was flashed upon the medical +darkness of western Europe from the east. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, +writing from Adrianople to a lady friend in the spring of 1717, flashed +that light in the concluding portion of her letter, as follows:-- + + "Apropos of distempers, I am going to tell you a thing that will make + you wish yourself here. The small-pox, so fatal and so general amongst + us, is here entirely harmless, by the invention of _ingrafting_, which + is the term they give it. There is a set of old women who make it + their business to perform the operation every autumn, in the month of + September, when the great heat is abated. People send to one another + to know if any of their family has a mind to have the small-pox; they + make parties for this purpose, and when they are met (commonly fifteen + or sixteen together), the old woman comes with a nut-shell full of the + matter of the best sort of small-pox, and asks what vein you please to + have opened. She immediately rips open that you offer to her with a + large needle (which gives you no more pain than a common scratch), and + puts into the vein as much matter as can lie upon the head of her + needle, and after that binds up the little wound with a hollow bit of + shell, and in this manner opens four or five veins. + + ... Every year thousands undergo this operation; and the French + ambassador says pleasantly, that they take the small-pox here by way + of diversion, as they take the waters in other countries. There is no + example of any one that has died in it; and you may believe I am well + satisfied of the safety of this experiment, since I intend to try it + on my own little son." + +This intention she carried into practice, and on her return to England +made great exertions to introduce inoculation into general use. The +medical profession opposed it so strongly, however, that for many years +the horrible distemper continued to rage unchecked. Such announcements as +the following were, in consequence, not unfrequent in the newspapers:-- + + "WHEREAS the TOWN of BURY ST. EDMUND'S, where the GENERAL QUARTER + SESSIONS of the PEACE of that Division are usually held, is now + afflicted with the Small-Pox, for which reason it might be of + exceeding ill consequence to the Country in General to hold the + Sessions there; This is, therefore, to acquaint the PUBLIC that the + next GENERAL QUARTER SESSIONS of the Peace will be held at the sign of + the PICKEREL in IXWORTH, on Monday next. + + "COCKSEDGE, Clerk of the Peace." + +Later on in the same year (1744) an advertisement appeared, signed by the +clergy, churchwardens, and medical practitioners of the town, stating that +"there were only twenty-one persons then lying ill of the small-pox." +Scarcely a week passed, in those days, without advertisements appearing of +the number of cases of the disease in certain towns. Careful study of a +large number of these announcements shows, however, that it was only +thought desirable to advertise when the epidemic was thought to be +abating, or when it had abated. Take the following, for instance:-- + + "Nov. 4, 1755. + + "Upon the strictest Inquiry made of the present state of the SMALL-POX + in BECCLES, it appears to be in eleven houses, and no more, and that + the truth may be constantly known, the same will be weekly advertised + alternately in the Ipswich and Norwich papers by us, + + "THO. PAGE, Rector. + "OSM. CLARKE and IS. BLOWERS, Churchwardens." + +In the following year we find it announced that, "upon a strict inquiry +made by the clerks through their respective parishes, delivered to us, and +attested by them, there is but six persons now afflicted with the +small-pox in this town,"--to wit, Colchester--and this statement is signed +by three ministers and six medical practitioners. In the _Ipswich Journal_ +of Jan. 22nd, 1757, the following appeared:--"There will be no fair this +year at Bildestone on Ash Wednesday, as usual, by reason of the small-pox +being in several parishes not far off." + +The practice of inoculation, though still frowned upon by a large +proportion of the medical profession, was growing at this time, as appears +from the following advertisement:-- + + "COLCHESTER, May 12, 1762. + + "The Practice of bringing people out of the country into this town to + be inoculated for the Small-pox being very prejudicial to the town in + many respects, but especially to the Trade thereof, and as by this + practice the distemper may be continued much longer in the town than + it otherwise would, in all probability, it is thought proper by some + of the principal inhabitants and traders in the town, that this public + notice should be given that they are determined to prosecute any + person or persons whomsoever, that shall hereafter bring into this + town, or who shall receive into their houses in the town as lodgers, + any person or persons for that purpose, with the utmost severity that + the law will permit.... But that they might not be thought + discouragers of a practice so salutary and beneficial to mankind, as + inoculation is found to be, which encourages great numbers to go into + the practice, the persons who have caused this public notice to be + given have no objection to surgeons carrying on the practice in houses + properly situated for the purpose." + +The "great numbers" of persons referred to in this notice as having "gone +into the practice" of inoculation for the small-pox appear to have been +chiefly old women, as in Turkey, and by some of these it was carried on +until the passing of the Vaccination Act in 1840. Five guineas was the fee +advertised in the _Ipswich Journal_ in 1761 for performing the operation +by Robert Sutton, an operator in Kent, who announced that he had "only met +with but one accident out of the many hundreds he has had under his cure." + +The prevalence of this hideous disease in the last century, and the dread +which it inspired, is curiously attested by the frequency with which +advertisements for servants, etc., appeared in the newspapers, in which +there was an express stipulation that applicants must have had the +small-pox. A housemaid or footman whose face bore the traces of this +disease would not, at the present day, find their appearance much in their +favour: but the following selection of advertisements, culled from the +_Ipswich Journal_ and the _Salisbury and Winchester Journal_, show that in +the last century the marks would increase their chances of obtaining +employment very considerably. The dates range from 1755 to 1781, and such +announcements might be increased to any extent. + + "A Three Years' APPRENTICE is wanted to use the Sea between + Manningtree and London, whose age is between 18 and 25 years, and has + had the Small-pox. Such a one, inquiring of MR. WM. LEACH, at Mistley + Thorne, in Essex, will hear of good encouragement." + + "WANTED, about Michaelmas, as Coachman, in a gentleman's family, who + can drive four horses, and ride postillion well. A Single Man, must + have had the Small-pox, and know how to drive in London. Such an one, + who can be well recommended, by giving a description of himself, his + age, and abilities, in a letter directed to A. B., at MR. J. + KENDALL'S, in COLCHESTER, may hear of a very good place." + + "WANTED, a JOURNEYMAN BAKER, that is a good workman, and has had the + SMALL-POX. Such a person may hear of a good place by applying to MR. + JOHN STOW, at Sudbury, or to the Printer of this paper." + + "Wanted an Apprentice to an eminent Surgeon in full practice in the + county of Suffolk. If he has not had the Small-Pox, it is expected he + will be inoculated for it, before he enters on business.--Enquire of + JOHN FOX, at Dedham, Essex." + + + "COLCHESTER, June 15th, 1762. + + "Wanted immediately, a Stout Lad as an Apprentice to a Currier. If he + can write it will be the more agreeable. Inquire further of ELEANOR + ONYON. N.B.--If he has not had the Small-pox, he need not apply." + + "WANTED for a gentleman that lives most part of the year in London, A + Genteel Person, between 28 and 40 years of age, that has had the + Small-pox, to be as Companion and Housekeeper. One that has been + brought up in a genteel, frugal and handsome manner, either a Maid or + Widow, so they have no incumbrances." + + "WANTED, a NURSEMAID. None need apply who cannot bring a good + character from their last place; and has had the Small-pox." + + "WANTS a place in a large or small family, in town or country, a YOUNG + MAN, who is well versed in the different branches of a Gardener, has + had the Small-pox, and can write a good hand." + + "WANTED, in a large family, a STOUT WOMAN, about 30, single, or a + widow without children, who has had the Small-pox, to take care of a + lusty child, under a year old. Her character must be unexceptionable, + and by no means a fashionable dresser, and lived in families of + credit. Any person answering this description may enquire of MRS. + MERCER, at the Star and Garter, Andover, and be further informed." + +It was about the time when the last of these advertisements appeared that +Jenner commenced his inquiries concerning the prophylactic virtues of +cow-pox, though nearly twenty years elapsed before they were sufficiently +advanced to enable him to make the results known. His idea of using +vaccine inoculation to bring about the total extinction of small pox was +scouted by those of his professional brethren to whom he mentioned it, and +we learn from one of his biographers that, at the outset, "both his own +observation and that of other medical men of his acquaintance proved to +him that what was commonly called cow-pox was not a certain preventive of +small-pox. But he ascertained by assiduous inquiry and personal +investigation that cows were liable to various kinds of eruption on their +teats, all capable of being communicated to the hands of the milkers; and +that such sores when so communicated were all called cow-pox." But when he +had traced out the nature of these various diseases, and ascertained which +of them possessed the protective virtue against small-pox, he was again +foiled by learning that in some cases when what he now called the true +cow-pox broke out among the cattle on a dairy farm, and had been +communicated to the milkers, they subsequently had small-pox. These +repeated failures perplexed him, but at the same time stimulated, instead +of discouraging him. He conceived the idea that the virus of cow-pox +might undergo some change which deprived it of its protective power, while +still enabling it to communicate a disease to human beings. Following up +the inquiry from this point, he at length discovered that the virus was +capable of imparting protection against small-pox only in a certain +condition of the pustule. + +He was now prepared to submit his theory to the test of experiment, but it +was not until 1796 that he had the opportunity. A dairymaid, who had +contracted cow-pox from one of her employer's cows, afforded the matter, +and Jenner introduced it into two incisions in the arms of a boy about +eight years of age. The disease thus transferred ran its ordinary course +without any ill effects, and the boy was afterwards inoculated with the +virus of small pox, which produced no effect. The disappearance of the +cow-pox from the dairies in the neighbourhood of his country practice in +Gloucestershire prevented him from making further experiments; and when he +visited London for that purpose, he had the mortification of finding that +no one could be found who would consent to be operated upon. It was not +until 1798 that this obstacle was overcome, and then, the results of the +earlier experiments having been confirmed by a series of vaccinations, +followed by inoculation for small-pox several months afterwards without +effect, Jenner made his discovery public. + +In the following year, vaccine inoculation began to spread, the practice +being taken up by many of Jenner's friends, including several who were not +in the medical profession. But, like inoculation for the small-pox, when +introduced by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu,--like all innovations on +established practices, indeed,--vaccination received for many years after +its introduction the most violent opposition. Just as inoculation for +small-pox had been denounced from the pulpit and in medical treatises as a +"diabolical operation" and a wicked interference with the designs of +Providence, so did a certain Dr. Squirrel denounce vaccination as an +attempt to change "the established laws of nature." The most absurd +stories were circulated of the effects alleged to have followed +vaccination. "A lady," it is stated by Mr. Bettany, "complained that since +her daughter had been vaccinated she coughed like a cow, and had grown +hairy all over her body; and in one country district it was stated that +vaccination had been discontinued there, because those who had been +inoculated in that manner bellowed like bulls." There were even doctors +who pretended to detect resemblances to bovine visages in the countenances +of children, produced, as they did not hesitate to declare, by +vaccination! Self-interest may have had as much to do as prejudice in +prompting the opposition of the profession. Many practitioners derived a +considerable portion of their income from fees for inoculation for +small-pox. Sutton, as we have seen, charged five guineas for the +operation, and advertised himself in many provincial newspapers; and the +income of Dr. Woodville, at one time physician to the Small-Pox Hospital, +is said to have sunk in one year from a thousand pounds to a hundred on +his adopting the practice of vaccination. + +Notwithstanding the prejudice and interested antagonism to which the new +practice was exposed, it continued to make way. The Rev. Dr. Booker, of +Dudley, gave the following striking testimony to its beneficial +effects:--"I have, previous to the knowledge of vaccine inoculation, +frequently buried, day after day, several (and once as many as eight) +victims of the small-pox. But since the parish has been blessed with this +invaluable boon of Divine Providence (cow pox), introduced among us nearly +four years ago, only two victims have fallen a prey to the above ravaging +disorder (small pox). In the surrounding villages, like an insatiable +Moloch, it has lately been devouring vast numbers, where obstinacy and +prejudice have precluded the Jennerian protective blessing." + +In 1803, the Royal Jennerian Institution was founded under royal +patronage, and with Jenner as president, to promote vaccination in London +and elsewhere; and its operations were continued for a few years with much +success, ceasing, however, on the establishment of the National Vaccine +Institution in 1808. Two years prior to this event, Lord Henry Petty, who +then held the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer, carried a motion in +the House of Commons, that the Royal College of Physicians should be +requested to inquire and report on the progress of vaccination. The +report, which appeared in the following year, set forth that, within eight +years from the discovery of vaccination, some hundreds of thousands of +persons had been vaccinated in the British Islands, and upwards of eight +hundred thousand in our East Indian possessions, and that the practice +had been generally adopted on the continent of Europe. Considering that +small-pox destroyed one-sixth of those whom it attacked, and that nearly +one-tenth, and in some years more than that proportion, of the entire +mortality in London was caused by it, and also the number, respectability, +and extensive experience of the advocates of vaccination, compared with +the feeble and imperfect testimonies of its few opponents, the value of +the practice seemed firmly established. + +This report did much to advance vaccination in public opinion. At the next +quarter sessions held at Stafford, it was taken into consideration by the +county magistrates, who, from its statements and the reports and +testimonials sent to Jenner, considered themselves justified in placing it +on record--"That vaccine inoculation, properly conducted, appeared never +to have failed as a certain preservative against small-pox; that it was +unattended by fever, and perfectly free from danger; that it required +neither confinement, loss of time, nor previous preparation; that it was +not infectious, nor productive of other diseases; that it might be +performed with safety on persons of every age and sex, and at all times +and seasons of the year." It was not, however, until 1840 that the results +of the labours of Jenner, the report of the Royal College of Physicians, +and the opinions of nearly the entire medical profession received +legislative endorsement by the passing of the Vaccination Act, since which +small-pox has become a thing of the past, except in cases where it has +been conserved by prejudice and ignorance. + + + + +Burkers and Body-Snatchers. + +BY THOMAS FROST. + + +How recollections will crowd upon the mind when a train of thought is set +in motion by the association of ideas! When, many years ago, I visited Dr. +Kahn's anatomical museum, then located in Tichborne Street, I there saw a +human skeleton which was affirmed by the lecturer, Dr. Sexton, to be that +of John Bishop, who was hanged in 1831, for the murder of an Italian boy +named Carlo Ferrari, at a house in Nova Scotia Gardens, one of the slums +then existing in the north-eastern quarter of London. Though nearly forty +years had elapsed since the commission of the crime, and I was only ten +years of age when I heard the horrible story which the sight of that +ghastly relic of mortality recalled to my mind, all the incidents +connected with it immediately passed before my mental vision like a +hideous phantasmagoria. The vividness with which they came back to me may +be accounted for by the deep impression which they made upon my mind at +the time of their occurrence. Those whose memories will carry them back +sixty years will readily understand this. + +At the time when the public mind was harrowed by the narration in the +newspapers of the horrible circumstances connected with the murder, and +for some time previously, a fearful excitement had been created in all +parts of the country by stories of murders committed and graves robbed of +their ghastly tenants for the purpose of supplying with "subjects" the +dissecting tables of the London and Edinburgh schools of anatomy. In the +latter city two miscreants named Burke and Hare had been convicted of +murder for this purpose, and one of them hanged for their crimes; but the +scare had not abated. Stories were told with appalling frequency of +corpses missing from lonely graveyards and of narrow escapes from murder +in little frequented places. Chloroform had not then been discovered, but +the Scotch professors of the art of murder had introduced the practice, +popularly named after one of them, of disabling their victims by means of +a pitch plaster suddenly clapped on the mouth. Every person who was +missing was thought to have been "burked," and the watching of graves to +prevent the removal of newly-buried corpses became an established +practice. As the dark nights of the late autumn came on, the fears of the +timid and nervous were doubled, and persons who lived in lonely places, or +in the ill-lighted parts of towns, became afraid to leave their houses +after nightfall. I remember hearing such fears expressed by several +persons at Croydon, with whom my parents were acquainted, and also of +neighbours combining to assist in watching the graves of deceased members +of each others' families. + +A few years ago, I was one day exchanging reminiscences of a long bygone +generation with a brother journalist, when, on this gruesome subject being +mentioned, he placed in my hands a report of the trial of the murderers of +Carlo Ferrari, which appeared to have been detached from a volume of +criminal trials. No feature of the horrible record impressed me so much as +the cool, business-like manner in which the wretches concerned in the +crime hawked the corpse of their victim from one school of anatomy to +another, and the equally cool and business-like manner in which the matter +was dealt with by those with whom their nefarious occupation brought them +in contact. The procuring of corpses for anatomical purposes was, in fact, +a regular trade, and the biographer of Sir Astley Cooper states that "the +Resurrection-men were occasionally employed on expeditions into the +country to obtain possession of the bodies of those who had been subjected +to some important operation, and of which a _post mortem_ examination was +of the greatest interest to science. Scarcely any distance from London was +considered an insuperable difficulty in the attaining of this object, and +as certainly as the Resurrectionist undertook the task, so certain was he +of completing it. This was usually an expensive undertaking, but still it +did not restrain the most zealous in their profession from occasionally +engaging these men in this employment." The price of a subject ranged from +seven to twelve guineas, but when the "body-snatchers" were specially +employed to procure some particular corpse, the incidental expenses were +often as much more. + +As an illustration of the times in which such horrors were possible, the +story of the murder of Carlo Ferrari may, at this distance of time from +the event, be worth telling. In the autumn of 1831, there lived in one of +a row of small houses, known as Nova Scotia Gardens, in the +poverty-stricken district of Bethnal Green, a man named John Bishop, with +his wife and three children. He had formerly been a carrier at Highgate, +but had long been suspected of "body-snatching," as the practice of +robbing graves was termed, and had no visible means of honest living. He +had the look of a man whose original rustic stolidity had been +supercharged with cockney cunning. The house adjoining Bishop's was +occupied by a man named Woodcock, who had succeeded in the tenancy a +glass-blower named Thomas Williams, described as a little, simple-looking +man, of mild and inoffensive demeanour. About two o'clock on the morning +of the 4th of November, Woodcock was awakened by a noise, as of a scuffle, +in Bishop's house, and afterwards heard two men leave it and return in a +few minutes, when he recognised the voices as those of Bishop and +Williams. At noon the same day these two men were in a neighbouring +public-house, accompanied by two other men, one of whom was known as James +May, who had formerly been a butcher, but for the last few years had been +suspected of following the same ghastly and revolting occupation as +Bishop. In the afternoon three men alighted from a cab at Nova Scotia +Gardens, two of them being recognised as Bishop and Williams, and +afterwards returned to the vehicle, when the former and the third man were +carrying something in a sack, which they placed in the cab. The three men +then entered, and it was driven off. + +About seven o'clock the same evening, Bishop and May presented themselves +at Guy's Hospital, carrying something in a sack, and asked the porter if a +"subject" was wanted. Receiving a negative reply, they asked him to allow +"it" to remain there until the next morning, to which he consented. +Half-an-hour later, the two traffickers in human flesh called at +Grainger's anatomical theatre, in Webb Street, Southwark, and told the +curator they had "a very fresh male subject, about fourteen years of age." +The offer being declined, they went away, and later on they were, +accompanied by Williams, in a public-house, where May was seen by a waiter +to pour water on a handkerchief containing human teeth, and then rub the +teeth together, remarking that they were worth two pounds to him. + +Next morning, May called upon a dentist named Mills, on Newington +Causeway, and sold a dozen teeth to him for a guinea, observing that they +were the teeth of a boy fourteen years of age. On examining them, Mills +found that morsels of the gums and splinters of the jaw were adhering to +them, as if much force had been used to wrench them out. Two hours later, +Bishop and May called again at the anatomical theatre in Southwark, and +repeated their offer of the preceding evening, which was again declined. +Shortly afterwards, they went to Guy's Hospital, accompanied by Williams +and a man named Shields, to remove the "subject" left there the evening +before, and it was given to them in the sack, as they had left it, and +placed in a large hamper, which Shields had brought for the purpose. There +was a hole in the sack, through which the porter saw a small foot +protruding, apparently that of a boy or a woman. + +About midnight, the bell of King's College was rung, and the porter, on +going to the gate, found there Bishop and May, whom he had seen there +before, it seems, and on similar business. May asked him if anything was +wanted, and receiving an indifferent answer, added that they had a male +"subject," a boy about fourteen years of age. The porter inquired the +price, and was told they wanted twelve guineas for it. He then said he +would ask Mr. Partridge, the demonstrator in anatomy, and they followed +him to a room adjoining the dissecting room. Nine guineas were offered, +which May, with an oath, refused, and went outside. Bishop then said to +the porter, "Never mind May, he is drunk; it shall come in for nine in +half-an-hour." They then went away, returning at the stipulated time, +accompanied by Williams and Shields, the latter carrying on his head the +hamper containing the corpse brought from Guy's Hospital. It was taken +into a room, where it was opened, and the corpse turned out of the sack by +May. The porter, observing a cut on the left temple, and that the left arm +was bent and the fingers clenched, conceived suspicions of foul play, and +communicated them at once to Mr. Partridge. That gentleman thereupon +examined the corpse, and mentioned its condition to the secretary, who +immediately gave information to the police. + +In order to detain the men until the arrival of the police, the +demonstrator showed them a L50 note, observing that he must get it changed +for gold before he could pay them. Several constables were soon on the +spot, and the four men were arrested, and taken to the station-house in +Vine Street, Covent Garden. On being charged on suspicion with having +unlawful possession of a corpse, May said he had nothing to do with it, +and had merely accompanied Bishop. A similar statement was made by +Williams, and Bishop said he was only removing the corpse from St. +Thomas's Hospital to King's College. Shields, who was known as a porter, +said he was employed to carry the hamper, which he did in the exercise of +his vocation. They were all then removed to the cells. + +The evidence given at the coroner's inquest by Partridge and two other +surgeons left no doubt that the unfortunate lad, respecting whose identity +there was no evidence, had been killed by a violent blow on the back of +the neck, which had affected the spinal cord. The four accused men were +present in custody during the inquiry, and Bishop, after reading a bill +relating to the murder, which was displayed on the wall of the room, was +heard by a constable to say, in a subdued tone, to May, "It was the blood +that sold us." Volunteering to give evidence, he said he got the corpse +from a grave, but declined to name the place whence he had got it, +alleging that the information would get into trouble two watchmen, who +had large families. May also made a voluntary statement, to the effect +that he got two "subjects" from the country, which he took first to +Grainger's theatre of anatomy, and afterwards to Guy's Hospital, +subsequently meeting Bishop, who promised him all he could get for a +"subject" above nine guineas if he would sell it for him. The inquest was +adjourned, and the police proceeded with their investigation. + +The houses of Bishop and May had been promptly visited and searched by the +police, who found at the former's a sack, a large hamper, and a brad-awl, +the last showing recent bloodstains. At May's house in Dorset Street, New +Kent Road, they found a pair of breeches, stained with blood at the back. +On a second visit to Bishop's house the garden was dug over, and a jacket, +trousers, and a shirt found in one spot, and in another a coat, trousers, +a vest with blood on the collar and one shoulder, and a shirt with the +front torn. When the brad-awl was produced at Bow Street police-court, May +said, "That is the instrument I punched the teeth out with." Shields was +eventually discharged from custody, but the other three prisoners were +committed for trial on the capital charge. + +The identity of the victim remained a mystery until the 19th of November, +a fortnight after the murder, when the corpse was recognised by a +foreigner named Brun as that of a boy named Carlo Ferrari, whom he had +brought from Italy two years before, but had not seen since July, 1830. +The boy picked up the means of living by exhibiting a tortoise and a pair +of white mice in the streets. He had been seen by several persons in or +near Nova Scotia Gardens on the 3rd of November, but he had not been seen +since, nor had he returned on that day to his miserable lodgings in +Charles Street, Drury Lane. The clothes found in Bishop's garden +corresponded with the description given of those worn by him when he was +last seen, and a little boy who played with Bishop's children stated that +they had, on the following day, shown him two white mice in a cage similar +to the one carried by Ferrari. + +The incidents of the crime, as revealed from day to day, and the mystery +in which the identity of the victim was for some time veiled, created so +much excitement in the public mind, that when the prisoners were placed +in the dock at the Old Bailey, early in December, the court was crowded, +and a guinea each was paid for seats in the gallery, the occupants of +which, all fashionably dressed, as might be expected of those who could +afford to pay that price for the gratification of their love of the +sensational, had taken their seats the day before. Though the evidence was +but a recapitulation of the story told before in the police-court and the +inquest-room, it was listened to with the utmost avidity. The witnesses +for the defence were few, and their evidence valueless, except in the case +of May, for whom an _alibi_ was established in respect of the time between +the afternoon of the day preceding the murder and noon on the following +day. The prisoners were sentenced to death, but in May's case the sentence +was commuted into transportation for life. A sea-faring relative of mine, +who was second officer of the vessel in which May was sent out to Sydney, +described him as an athletic, wiry-looking man, with features expressive +of sternness, and a determined will, quite a different-looking man, +therefore, to his two companions in crime, who were duly hanged at +Newgate. + +The crime of these men, and the deeds of Burke and Hare, created such a +scare, and exposed so vividly the temptation to murder afforded by the +prices paid by surgeons for "subjects," that the attention of parliament +was directed to the matter, and a Select Committee of the House of Commons +was appointed to inquire and report as to the facilities which might be +given for obtaining bodies for anatomical purposes in a legitimate manner. + +Sir Astley Cooper, who was one of the eminent surgeons who gave evidence +before this committee, was asked whether the state of the law prevented +teachers of anatomy from obtaining the body of any person, which, in +consequence of some peculiarity of structure, they might be desirous of +procuring. He replied:--"The law does not prevent our obtaining the body +of an individual if we think proper; for there is no person, let his +situation in life be what it may, whom, if I were disposed to dissect, I +could not obtain.... The law only enhances the price, and does not prevent +the exhumation. Nobody is secured by the law; it only adds to the price of +the subject." The result of this inquiry was the passing of the Anatomy +Act, by which the bodies of persons dying in hospitals and workhouses, if +unclaimed by the relatives, may be placed at the disposal of the schools +of anatomy. + + + + +Reminiscences of the Cholera. + +BY THOMAS FROST. + + +It is now more than sixty years since the strange and mysterious +visitation, as it was then considered, known as the cholera morbus, for +which fearsome name that of Asiatic cholera has since been substituted, +made its first appearance in this country, or anywhere west of the Ural +Mountains. Coming first from India, from the banks of the Ganges and the +Indus, the dread pestilence moved steadily westward and north-westward +until, creeping along the rivers of Russia, and desolating all the most +considerable towns of that country, it reached St. Petersburg. There it +raged with fearful severity, mowing down as with the scythe of Death more +than a thousand persons daily. So dreadful were the features of the +unknown malady, and so rapidly were its victims carried off, that the +ignorant populace of the capital attributed it to poison administered by +the doctors. A fearful tumult was excited by this belief, and it was with +great difficulty that it was suppressed. + +From Russia the dire disease spread rapidly into almost every country in +Europe, and wherever it appeared created the profoundest awe and the most +bewildering terror. In Paris it broke out with extreme malignity in March, +1832, and soon raged there with greater virulence than it had exhibited in +any other city in Europe except St. Petersburg. The deaths soon reached +from four to five hundred daily, and during April they rose to a total for +the month of twelve thousand seven hundred. It was hinted that the ravages +of this new and dreadful disease were caused by the poisoning of the meat +sold in the markets and the water in the public fountains; and the +dwellers in the slums became so infuriated by this horrible and absurd +rumour that mobs perambulated the streets howling for vengeance on the +poisoners. Many unfortunate persons were murdered in the streets on being +denounced as the perpetrators of these imaginary crimes, and so paralysed +was the arm of justice by the influence of terror that nothing was done to +vindicate the majesty of the law. Everyone who could afford to leave Paris +fled from it with precipitation, and the city was abandoned to desolation +and anarchy. The legislative labours of the two Chambers were suspended, +and the peers and deputies were the first to set the example of flight, +though Louis Philippe and his family continued to reside at the Tuileries, +with an occasional sojourn of a few days at Neuilly. + +I have a vivid recollection of the mingled awe and terror which this fell +disease inspired when it was announced that it had crossed the sea and +made its first victims in this country. It had made its way across the +continent from town to town on the banks of the great rivers, but into +England it was imported by sick sailors. Many generations had passed away +since anything like a pestilence had been known in England, and the +cholera therefore created a panic among all classes of the people, which +served to augment its virulence and render those of a nervous temperament +more liable to be attacked by it. Doctors were utterly unacquainted with +its proper treatment, and indeed had no knowledge whatever of the disease. +Hence it raged without check wherever it appeared, and the rapidity with +which it carried off its victims added to the terror inspired by its +approaches. The first death at Lower Norwood, where my parents then +resided, was that of the pastor of the Independent Chapel, situated only +two doors from my father's house. He died in a few hours from the time he +experienced the premonitory symptoms, and such was the dread of infection +that the corpse was buried the same night by torchlight, in the +burial-ground of the chapel, wrapped in a sheet coated with pitch. + +Though a period of seventeen years separated the first cholera epidemic +from the second, the lessons which the former should have taught had not +been so well learned as they should have been, and the latter, with which +these reminiscences are chiefly concerned, inspired a wild, unreasoning +terror in only a little less degree than that of 1832. + +I remember a case at Mitcham, in which the women attending a patient were +seized with a panic on the approach of death, and rushed out of the house, +leaving the poor wretch, a woman, to die alone, the corpse being +afterwards found rigid and distorted. + +The apparently erratic manner in which the disease spread, sometimes +carrying off victims from one side of a street and sparing the other side, +sometimes smiting every member of a family in one house, and passing over +all the other houses in the same street, was a puzzle to persons who had +given no attention to the causes of the disease, and were content to +regard it as a sign of the wrath of God, reasoning about the matter as +little as did the Israelites whose relatives were swept off at +Kibroth-hattaavah. They had not given sufficient attention to the laws of +health to understand that the disease found its victims where those laws +were neglected, whether from carelessness or from ignorance. + +I remember two cases at Croydon in which all the inmates of the houses in +which the disease manifested its dread presence were carried off by it. +One occurred in a cottage in St. James's Road, one of a row which had +originally been level with the road, but had become overshadowed by the +approach to the railway bridge. There were three victims in that house, +and no other case in the same row, or in the neighbourhood. The other case +occurred in King Street, one of several narrow, closely-built streets in +the centre of the town, and the victims were a widow and her only child, +the latter dying not alone, for, like Byron's Haidee,-- + + "----she held within + A second principle of life, which might + Have dawned a fair and sinless child of sin; + But closed its little being without light, + And went down to the grave unborn, wherein + Blossom and bough lie withered with one blight." + +A remarkable incident occurred while the fell disease was in the full +swing of its ravages. The wife of a working man living in the Old Town, a +low-lying and densely populated quarter, was attacked by it, and at once +removed to a temporary hospital that had been established on Duppas Hill, +a tabular eminence overlooking the town, and in the thirteenth century the +scene of the tournament in which the son of Earl Warrenne was by +misadventure slain. There her husband went, on his return from labour, to +ascertain her condition, and heard with a shock which the reader may +imagine that she was dead. When the poor fellow had in some degree +recovered from the blow, he expressed a wish to see the corpse and take it +to his home. He seems to have been unable to realise that his wife was +really dead, though the nurses and doctors assured him that she had passed +away. The idea that life yet lingered in the form that was apparently +lifeless grew upon him as he gazed and though he may never have read "The +Giaour," he may have felt the force of the thought so finely expressed by +Byron in the lines that introduce his picture of the Greece of his day:-- + + "He who hath bent him o'er the dead, + Ere the first day of death is fled, + The first dark day of nothingness, + The last of danger and distress + (Before Decay's effacing fingers + Have swept the lines where beauty lingers), + And marked the mild angelic air, + The rapture of repose that's there, + The fixed yet tender traits that streak + The languor of the pallid cheek, + And--but for that sad shrouded eye, + That fires not, wins not, weeps not, now, + And but for that chill, changeless brow, + Where cold Obstruction's apathy + Appals the gazing mourner's heart, + As if to him it could impart + The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon; + Yes, but for these, and these alone, + Some moments, aye, one treacherous hour, + He still might doubt the tyrant's power; + So fair, so calm, so softly sealed, + The first, last look by death revealed!" + +Whether it was feeling or reason that inspired the thought that life yet +lingered in the apparently inanimate, but not yet rigid form, which the +loving husband conveyed to his humble dwelling, it was undoubtedly to that +inspiration that the woman owed her preservation from death. For she was +not dead. Signs of returning animation were perceived when the supposed +corpse was placed upon the bed, and the neighbour women who came in to +perform the last sad offices for the dead were there to welcome her on her +return to life. I will not attempt to describe the feelings with which the +husband beheld the eyelids of his wife unclose, and the rose-tints return +to the pallid cheeks. Like the Greek painter who, conscious of the +inadequacy of his art to fully portray the grief of Agamemnon for the loss +of his son, covered the countenance of the old king with a veil, I draw +the curtain upon the scene, and leave it to the imagination of the reader. + +Among the remedies for the cholera which came into vogue during the +prevalence of the epidemic of 1849, the rubbing of the stomach with brandy +and salt obtained a considerable degree of repute; and the chemists vied +with each other, as in the recent epidemics of influenza, in the +concoction and advertising of various cholera mixtures, one of the most +efficacious of which was a preparation of opium and chalk. + +The lessons of the cholera were not so entirely neglected on this occasion +as they were after the epidemic of 1832; but it is a sad reflection on our +legislation that we were indebted to the ravages of disease, or rather to +the fear inspired by them, for sanitary reforms which ought to have +resulted from foresight. There had been sanitary inquiries by Royal +Commissions between 1842 and 1849, but little had been done towards +carrying out the recommendations which resulted from them. The existence +of cholera in India, and the causes which produced it, had long been +known; but so long as its ravages were confined to the people of that +country no one seemed to think that it concerned the people of England. It +was known, too, that whatever might be the true causes of zymotic +diseases, concerning which medical opinions differed, accumulations of +filth, contaminated sources of water supply, and an impure condition of +the atmosphere tended to produce their outbreaks, and to aggravate their +virulence. But then we had been used to these evils since the days of the +Plantagenets, and though they had become intensified with the increase of +population and the growth of the large towns, had not Malthus taught us +that epidemics of disease were one of the means used by divine providence +to prevent the numbers of the human race from exceeding the means of +subsistence? + +The cholera epidemic of 1849 roused the public mind from its lethargy, and +prepared it to act upon the recommendations of the General Board of Health +and to comply with the Sanitary Act of that year. The old wells of London +were closed, and the like course was adopted in Croydon, where a constant +supply of practically pure water was obtained by boring down to the chalk. +Other towns followed the example, one of the foremost being Birmingham, +which received a supply which enabled the inhabitants to dispense with the +insalubrious rain-water butt. Sewerage works were undertaken where no +efficient system of drainage had before existed. Attention was called to +the important questions of sewage disposal and the pollution of rivers; +and though much even now remains to be done in this direction, and in the +improvement of the water supply of the large manufacturing towns of +Yorkshire and Lancashire, sanitation has been cleared of most of its +difficulties by better knowledge of the philosophy of cause and effect, so +that we no longer regard the calamities resulting from our own ignorance +and neglect of the laws of nature as the inflictions of Providence. + + + + +Some Old Doctors. + +BY MRS. G. LINNAEUS BANKS. + + +It is not my intention to go back to those Greek fathers of the healing +art, Hippocrates and Galen, or to dwell on the days when every monastery +held within its walls some learned brother accredited to administer to +bodies as well as souls diseased, or when the mistress of every feudal +castle, every baronial-hall, was trained and skilled in leechcraft, +distilled herbs, concocted potions and unguents, and not only physicked +her household, but was prepared to staunch and dress the gaping wounds +received in siege or tournay. Nor yet have we ought to do with those +pretenders to science who mingled astrology with pharmacy, ascribed to +every plant its ruling planet, and held that the potency of all herbs +depended on the conjunction of planets, or the phase of the moon under +which they were gathered--a belief, indeed, under which old Nicholas +Culpepper compiled his well-known "Herbal" early in the seventeenth +century. + +Medicine and surgery have made rapid strides since the days, not a century +agone, when in the naval cockpit, and on the open battlefield, the hatchet +was the ready implement for amputation, the rough cautery that of a red +hot iron applied to the fizzing flesh; and when the doctor cried, "Spit, +man, spit" to the suffering soldier with a gunshot wound in his chest, and +when the sputum came tinged with blood, simply plugged up the bullet-hole +and left the poor fellow to his fate, while he passed on to cases less +hopeless. And _en passant_ I may say that wooden legs and stumps for arms +were so common in the writer's young days as scarcely to attract +attention--so ready were army surgeons to amputate. + +These are not matters on which I have to dwell, but I think the present +work would be incomplete without a record of those men of original mind, +whose acute observation and unwearied investigations in the past have +indissolubly linked their names with discoveries which have revolutionised +the practice of both medicine and surgery. + +In the opinion of Solomon, "there is nothing new under the sun;" and if +such was the case in his day, how much more of a verity must be the +truism in ours. + +So the most startling and perfect revelation of any great fact in human +physiology may have been dimly perceptible to earlier intelligences +groping in the dark, faint adumbrations of which may fall on the sensorium +of the final discoverer, until a ray of divine light dispels the mists of +ages, and the man, developing his crude idea with infinite pains, realises +a great truth, and cries out "Eureka" to an astonished--and too often--an +unbelieving world. + +Thus it may have been with the renowned practitioner, WILLIAM HARVEY, who +came into the world when all England was filled with alarms of an +"Invincible Spanish Armada," then preparing to devastate our shores and +spare neither man nor maid, babe nor mother. Yet the scare passed and +peace came, and the boy grew, until his educational course at Cambridge +ended, and his bias led him towards Padua, then the great seat of +academical and medical lore, and there he took his doctor's degree in +physic. With the prestige of Padua upon him, in 1607, when he was but +twenty years of age, he was elected Fellow of the College of Physicians +(founded by Dr. Linacre in the reign of Henry VII.), and in 1715, the man +of twenty-eight became their Anatomical Reader. + +A noteworthy appointment this, since consequent study and investigation +led to the grand discovery that the heart--to speak unscientifically--was +a sort of muscular pumping-engine, sending the blood circulating along a +series of blood-vessels to every part of the system, changing in character +on its course until it returned to its centre, the seat of life, to be +pumped out afresh to circulate as before and do its appointed work. + +In 1628, Harvey made his discovery known in a learned treatise "On the +circulation of the blood," and as may be supposed, his daring assertions +roused a violent spirit of opposition amongst his medical brethren, even +among those who began to feel the pulses of their patients for the first +time, and to comprehend _why_ there should be a fluttering or audible +beating under the sick one's ribs, and wherefore the fatal hemorrhage +following a sword-thrust or a gunshot wound. + +In spite of opposition his teaching created a revolution in medical +practice. The discoverer was called before Charles I. and his Court to +demonstrate the action of the heart and subsidiary organs, in support of +his new doctrine. + +Fresh honours fell upon him even when too old to bear the burden. And when +in the fulness of time, William Harvey, who had outlived three monarchs, +made his own exit under Cromwellian rule, he bequeathed infinitely more to +posterity in his invaluable discovery than can be summed up in the estate, +library, and museum now in the proud possession of the College of +Physicians. These are held by a mere body of men. The other has a +world-wide significance. + +Yet, as in his life, even in his grave, detractors strove to dim the glory +of his important revelation, ascribing to the theological physician +Servetus, to Realdus Columbus, and to Andreas Caesalpinas, the credit of +prior discovery. + +It remained for another learned physician, a century later, to deal with +these counter-claims, and whilst admitting their vague individual +conceptions of an elusive mystery, to establish once and for ever William +Harvey's inalienable right as sole discoverer. + +This notable champion was JOHN FREIND, M.D., F.R.S., distinguished as the +Medical Historian, and Harveian lecturer to the College of Physicians, at +a time when he and his fellows shaved their heads and mounted Ramillies +wigs as outward guarantees for the profundity of wisdom they enshrined. + +But apart from his flowing wig, or his defence of Harvey, or his learned +medical history, written in part when he was a prisoner in the Tower for +supposed complicity in the Atterbury Plot, or for skill in the treatment +of disease, John Freind had a pioneer's claim to distinction. + +The doctor, strange to say, was a Member of Parliament, and on resuming +his seat on his release from incarceration, he brought before the House of +Commons, in 1725, a remarkable petition from the Royal College of +Physicians, to restrain "the pernicious use of spirituous liquors." And +though he might speak but as the mouthpiece of his brother Fellows, it +needed no small degree of courage to broach such a subject in those days +of general coarse indulgence among all classes; especially if his own +language was as direct and forcible as that of the petitioners. + +Therefore, in his triple character as the historian of medicine, as the +champion of William Harvey, and as the foremost M.P. to advocate the +cause of temperance before our national legislative assembly, John Freind, +M.D., claims a niche in our Walhalla of notable old doctors. + +In the nave of Westminster Abbey on a memorial of polished granite is this +inscription--"Beneath are deposited the remains of JOHN HUNTER, born at +Long Calderwood, Lanarkshire, N.B., on February 14th, 1728; died in London +on October 10th, 1793. His remains were removed from the Church of St. +Martins-in-the-Fields to this Abbey on March 28th, 1858. The Royal College +of Surgeons of England have placed this table over the grave of Hunter to +record their admiration of his genius as a gifted interpreter of the +Divine power and wisdom that works in the laws of organic life, and their +grateful veneration for his services to mankind as the Father of +scientific surgery. 'O Lord, how manifold are Thy works; in wisdom hast +Thou made them all.'" + +Such honours are not paid to the remains of men of common stamp. And of no +common stamp was the sandy-headed youth who, having spent ten years of his +life learning cabinet making, resolved on striking out a better career for +himself; and in his twentieth year took horse and journeyed to London to +place himself under his elder brother, WILLIAM HUNTER, then rising into +note as a medical practitioner and a teacher of anatomy. In October, 1748, +he entered his brother's dissecting room, and whether the fitting of +joints in cabinetware had been of initiatory service, or he had had access +to the books of his medical relations in Glasgow, or that as a boy upon +his father's farm, observation of the domestic animals and of the wild +inhabitants of wood and fell, had roused the desire to master the secrets +of animated nature, sure it is that William speedily foretold a successful +future for his new pupil as an anatomist. + +At all events he used his interest to place his promising brother under +the eminent surgeon of Chelsea Hospital, and later under another at St. +Bartholomew's. Then, shocked by the rough speech and manners of his +countrified brother, and his need of education, the classical elder packed +him off to college to pick up a little refinement along with Latin and +Greek. + +In vain. Irrepressible and hot-tempered John could not sit down quietly to +study dead languages. Back he came from Oxford in haste, to study dead +bodies in his brother's dissecting room, and serve as demonstrator to his +course of lectures, simultaneously with his study of living bodies at St. +George's Hospital, where in a comparatively short time he became +house-surgeon. + +His appointment as staff-surgeon to our troops on foreign service marked +the six intervening years before he settled down to practise in London. He +had laboured ten years on human anatomy, and had dissected a number of the +lower animals, laying the foundation of his collection of comparative +anatomy. Even while on foreign service he had amused himself with studying +the digestive faculties of snakes and lizards when in a torpid state, and +many were the contributions he sent home to his brother's museum. + +His return to London, as a teacher of surgery and anatomy, was a marked +success, though private practice had to grow. In 1776, he was appointed +surgeon extraordinary to His Majesty George III., but eleven years prior +to this was admitted a Fellow of the Royal Society, slightly in advance of +his elder brother. Then in 1768, the bachelor, William, shifted himself +and his museum from Jermyn Street to Windmill Street, and resigned the +lease to John, thus securing independent action to the latter, and +facilities for creating a natural-history museum of his own. + +Hitherto, the brothers had worked together in unison, but now John +committed the unpardonable offence of bringing home to Jermyn Street "a +tocherless bride," fourteen years younger than himself, endowed only with +beauty and accomplishments, and a faculty for filling the house with +assemblies of wit and fashion, which blunt-spoken John designated +"kick-ups," no doubt with an irreverent big D as a prefix, swearing being +as characteristic as hard work. + +And work hard he did, early and late, not merely to maintain his extensive +and lucrative practice, but to provide and prepare subjects for the museum +in the rear of his town house, and for the valuable and original lectures +he delivered in language forcible and clear, if neither refined nor +academic. + +His chief workshop, so to speak, was at his country "Box" at Earl's Court, +the grounds of which he had converted into a zoological garden, so many +wild animals were there kept for study. There is a story told of his +facing an escaped lion and flicking him back to his den with his pocket +handkerchief, showing his fearlessness and his knowledge of leonine +nature. + +Another tale is told of his intervention between fighting dogs and +leopards, he dragging the infuriated leopards back to their cage by their +collars--and _fainting_ when the feat was accomplished, for his was not a +burly frame, and his heart was in a threatening condition. + +An element of humour mingles with the gruesome in Sir B. W. Richardson's +account of the ruse employed to cheat watchful executors, and obtain the +body of O'Brien the Irish Giant,[2] so as to convert it into the skeleton +now in the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, Lincoln's +Inn. + +Those were the days when surgeons were not particular where they obtained +subjects for their scalpels, whether from the resurrection men or from the +gallows, and John Hunter was not more dainty than his fellows. But also +from travelling shows and menageries, and from animals that died in the +Tower he was supplied. And so rapidly did his museum grow, absorbing the +bulk of his income, that ere long he had to remove to what is now +Leicester Square, and erect a building in the rear for his collection. + +Honours fell upon him thickly as they had fallen on his brother, alike +British and foreign, of which he took little heed, absorbed as he was in +the pursuit of knowledge, and its demonstration. His discoveries placed +him far ahead of the science of his time, though his courtly brother, +earlier in the field and first to leave it, ran him close. Indeed their +final quarrel and alienation arose out of a disputed claim to a certain +discovery in feminine physiology, brought before the Royal Society, a +quarrel which transferred William's museum to the University of Glasgow, +and excluded John from his will. + +The so-called "Lyceum Medicum" in Leicester Square, became the home of the +"Society for the Improvement of Medical and Chirurgical Knowledge," and +the "Philosophical Transactions" of the Society testify to the genius and +untiring activity of its promoter. How he found time for his many written +essays and discourses on topics wide apart as "Gunshot-wounds" and "Teeth" +is a marvel. No wonder the frail human machine wore out so early. He had +worked when he should have rested, worked regardless of premonitions and +attacks John Hunter must have well understood, and died at last at +sixty-two, a victim of one of those fits of passion no man with a diseased +heart can indulge in safely. + +Setting out originally from the tablet in Westminster Abbey to describe +what manner of man was the old doctor who lay beneath, it became +imperatively necessary to bracket the two brothers, John and William +Hunter, together, since, according to Sir B. W. Richardson, they were +"twins in science," if not in birth. Had not William already come to the +front when John sought him out, he could not have been his teacher, or +given his younger brother his first start in life, his introduction, or +his facilities for study. Then they worked together, became one in +anatomical discovery, in their zeal for collecting all that illustrated +their theories, all that was rare and curious, into unprecedented museums. +Yet how widely the personalities of the brothers differed. They both stood +out among contemporaries, yet William, with his slight form, mildly +refined face, set off by an unpretentious wig, and delicate hands, under +lace ruffles, and wide coat cuffs, a classical scholar, an antiquary, a +numismatist, as well as a naturalist,--Queen Charlotte's medical referee, +stepping out from his chariot, gold cane in hand, to visit his courtly +patients, was the very _beau ideal_ of a fashionable physician of that +day, one who shone in drawing-rooms as well as in the lecture-hall. +Blue-eyed John, with high cheek bones, broad, slightly receding forehead, +tangled red hair, and a shaggy mane of whisker that made his keen face a +triangle, tender of heart, yet brusque and coarse of speech, rough in +manner as in dress (with not a sign of frill or ruffle), despising +dilettante coteries, not squeamish in seeking "subjects," passionate and +determined, caring little for empty honours, for money only to swell his +museum, and nothing for courtly circles, though created +surgeon-extraordinary to George III., and owing his large practice solely +to the force of his character, his science, and his skill. So far he was +his brother's antithesis. John was a diamond in the rough; William the gem +cut and polished. And such were the two old doctors to whom England's +College of Surgeons owes its Hunterian Museum; the University of Glasgow +the other. Had not the brothers quarrelled, the two would have formed one +grand unrivalled collection. + +Space is limited, and so must be our notes of these other celebrated "old +doctors," whom it would be invidious to overlook. Of these EDWARD JENNER +stands prominently out, but he has been already dealt with by another +hand. + +It is scarcely possible to pass by JOHN ABERNETHY, F.R.S., the eccentric +physician, whose principle was that men should eat to live, not live to +eat, who maintained that the stomach was the chief seat of health or +disease, according as it was used or abused, and that water was the one +natural and nutrient beverage. The practical way in which he illustrated +his theories respecting overfeeding,--filling a pail with food from +various dishes in correspondence with the heterogeneous mixture on his +patients' plates--and his brusque replies to some other of his patients, +have perpetuated his name through his oddities, rather than as a +benefactor of his kind, who revolutionized the medical practice of his +time, and of course excited envy and antagonism. His hair, kept together +at the nape of the neck with a ribbon tie, was brushed back from his +forehead, and added a degree of sharpness to his somewhat hatchet-shaped +face, when he told the timorous lady who was "afraid she had swallowed a +spider," "Then put a fly in your mouth, madam, and the spider will come up +to catch him." Or when he threw the shilling from his fee back to a mother +with a delicate daughter, "Take that, madam, and buy her a skipping-rope," +an intimation that exercise was needed. It was an age of coarse feeding +and strong drinking, an age of drastic purges and much blood-letting, and +Abernethy's temperance principles, so much in advance of his time, +provoked considerable opposition from his medical brethren, whose +satirical epigrams he was not slow to cap. + +But contemporary squibs and satires cannot affect the real good which has +made Abernethy's name a household word. Indeed it has been stamped upon a +biscuit. It is stamped also on a medical society he founded at St. +Bartholomew's Hospital, where his centenary has recently been celebrated. + +Many have been the contributions to scientific medicine and surgery since +the rough days of the old doctors I have endeavoured to chronicle, but +these men of wigs and ties, gold-headed canes and pouncet-boxes, breeches +and buckled shoes, were the pioneers of progress, they cleared the way +for the men of this day and generation, and left their mark on their own +age, not to be effaced by newer and more advanced successors, to whom they +have served as stepping-stones. + + + + +The Lee Penny. + + +The story of the Lee Penny is full of historic interest, and the legends +respecting it furnished Sir Walter Scott with some incidents for his novel +the "Talisman." + +This amulet is a stone of a deep red colour and triangular shape, in size +about half-an-inch on each side, and is set in a silver coin. The various +accounts which have come under our notice are agreed that this curious +relic of antiquity has been in the Lee family since a period immediately +after the death of King Robert the Bruce. + +The monarch was nearing his end, and as he lay on his death-bed, he was +much troubled for having failed to visit in person the Holy Land to assist +in the Crusade. His long war with the English had rendered it impossible +for him to leave his kingdom to fight in a foreign land, even in the cause +of religion. + +Sir James Douglas, his tried and trusty friend, stood beside the bed of +his king, and was in sore distress. As a last request the king implored +that as soon as possible after his soul had left his body Douglas would +take his heart to Jerusalem. On the honour of a knight, Sir James +faithfully promised to discharge the trust. + +The king died in 1329, and his heart was enclosed in a silver case. Sir +James suspended it from his neck with a chain, and without delay gathered +round him a suitable retinue, and made his way towards the Holy Land. He +was not destined to reach that country, for on his route the intelligence +reached him that Alphonso, King of Leon and Castile, was waging war with +the Moorish chief, Osmyn of Granada. To assist the Christians, he felt it +was his duty, and in accordance with the dying charge of his king. With +courage he engaged in the fray, but was soon surrounded by horsemen, and +he who had fought so long and bravely, realised that he must meet his doom +far from the country he loved so well. He made a desperate effort to +escape. The precious casket he took from his neck and threw it before him, +saying, "Onward, as thou were wont, thou noble heart! Douglas will follow +thee." He followed it and was slain. After the battle was over the brave +knight was found resting on the heart of Bruce. The mortal remains of the +valiant knight were carried back to his home and buried in his church of +St. Bride, at Douglas. + +The heart of Bruce was entrusted to Sir Simon Locard, and by him borne +back to Scotland, and at last found a resting-place beneath the high altar +of Melrose Abbey, and its site is still pointed out. Mrs. Hemans wrote a +charming poem on Bruce's heart in Melrose Abbey, commencing:-- + + "Heart! that did'st press forward still, + Where the trumpet's note rang shrill; + Where the knightly swords are crossing, + And the plumes like sea-foam tossing, + Leader of the charging spear, + Fiery heart! and liest thou here? + May this narrow spot inurn + Aught that could so beat and burn?" + +We are told the family name of Locard was changed to Lockheart, or +Lockhart, from the circumstance of Sir Simon having carried the key of the +casket, and was granted as armorial insignia, heart with a fetter-lock, +with the motto, "Corda serrata pando." According to a contributor to +Chambers's "Book of Days," v., 2, p. 415, from the same incident, the +Douglases bear a human heart, imperially crowned, and have in their +possession an ancient sword, emblazoned with two hands holding a heart, +and dated 1329, the year Bruce died. + +Lockhart was not daunted at the failure of the first attempt to reach +Jerusalem, and, in company with such Scottish knights as escaped the fate +of their leader, they once more proceeded, and arrived in the Holy Land, +and for some time fought in the wars against the Saracens. + +[Illustration: THE LEE PENNY.] + +The following adventure is said to have befallen him. He made prisoner in +battle an Emir of wealth and note. The aged mother of his captive came to +the Christian camp to save her son from his captivity. Lockhart fixed the +price at which his prisoner should ransom himself; and the lady, pulling +out a large embroidered purse, proceeded to tell down the amount. In this +operation, a pebble inserted in a coin, some say of the lower empire, fell +out of the purse, and the Saracen matron testified so much haste to +recover it as to give the Scottish knight a high idea of its value. "I +will not consent," he said, "to grant your son's liberty unless the amulet +be added to the ransom." The lady not only consented to this, but +explained to Sir Simon the mode in which the talisman was to be used. The +water in which it was dipped operated as a styptic, or a febrifuge, and +the amulet possessed several other properties as a medical talisman. + +Sir Simon Lockhart, after much experience of the wonders which it wrought, +brought it to his own country, and left it to his heirs, by whom, and by +Clyde side in general, it was, and is still, distinguished by the name of +the Lee Penny, from the name of his native seat of Lee. + +Its virtues were brought into operation by dropping the stone in water +which was afterwards given to the diseased to drink, washing at the same +time the part affected. No words were used in dipping the stone, or money +permitted to be taken by the servants of Lee. People came from all parts +of Scotland, and many places in England, to carry away the water to give +to their cattle. + +Some interesting information respecting this amulet appears in an account +of the Sack and Siege of Newcastle-on-Tyne in 1644. "As one of the natural +sequences," says the writer, "of prolonged distress, caused by this brave +but foolhardy defence against overwhelming odds, the plague broke out +with fatal violence in Newcastle and Gateshead, as well as Tynemouth and +Shields, during the following year. Great numbers of poor people were +carried off by it; while tents were erected on Bensham Common, to which +those infected were removed; and the famous Lee Penny was brought out of +Scotland to be dipped in water for the diseased persons to drink, and the +result said to be a perfect cure. The inhabitants (that is to say, the +Corporation, we presume), gave a bond for a large sum in trust for the +loan; and they thought the charm did so much good, that they offered to +pay the money down, and keep the marvellous penny with a stone in which it +is inserted; but the proprietor, Lockhart of Lee, would not part with it." + +We are told that many years ago a remarkable cure is alleged to have been +performed on Lady Baird of Sauchton Hall, near Edinburgh, who, having been +bitten by a mad dog, was seized with hydrophobia. The Lee Penny was sent +for, and she used it for some weeks, drinking and bathing in the water it +had been dipped in, and she quite recovered. + +"The most remarkable part of the history," as Sir Walter Scott says, +"perhaps was, that it so especially escaped condemnation when the Church +of Scotland chose to impeach many other cures which savoured of the +miraculous, as occasioned by sorcery, and censured the appeal of them, +'excepting only the amulet called the Lee Penny, to which it pleased God +to annex certain healing virtues, which the Church did not presume to +condemn.'" + +The Lee Penny is preserved at Lee House, in Lanarkshire, the residence of +the present representative of the family. + + + + +How Our Fathers were Physicked. + +BY J. A. LANGFORD, LL.D. + + +Delightful old Fuller tells us "Necessary and ancient their Profession +ever since man's body was subject to enmity and casualty." There is no +doubt of the necessity and antiquity of the doctor's calling, but there +is, without doubt, no profession in which such great and beneficent +advance has been made in modern times as in the medical. The tortures +which our fathers endured under the old treatment are terrible to think +of. It was not enough that they were afflicted by disease; the pains which +they had to suffer from the supposed remedies far exceeded those which +nature imposed. Cupping, blistering, and especially bleeding, were the +common applications in nearly all complaints, the Bleeding was also used +as a preventive, which proverb truly tells us "is better than cure"; but +in this case the supposed disease could scarcely have been worse than the +supposed prevention. Five times in the year--"in September, before +Advent, before Lent, after Easter, and at Pentecost"--were the periods at +which men in health were accustomed to "breathe a vayne." Besides letting +of blood, the physician's cane and the surgeon's club were vigorously used +on the unfortunate sufferers. Mr. J. C. Jeaffreson, in his very +interesting "Book about Doctors," says, "For many centuries fustigation +was believed in as a sovereign remedy for bodily ailments as well as moral +failings, and a beating was prescribed for an ague as frequently as for +picking and stealing." So what with the lancet and the stick combined, our +fathers must indeed have shuddered at the approach of any of the "natural +shocks that flesh is heir to." + +The medicines of those good old times were of a very strange and +objectionable kind. Some of the concoctions were composed of many +ingredients, and were formed of abominable, not to say disgusting, +materials. All nature was ransacked for out-of-the-way and horrible things +which could be used as drugs and nostrums for suffering and gullible +sufferers. In the reign of Charles II., Dr. Thomas Sherley "recommended a +clumsy and inordinate administration of violent drugs" for gout. "Calomel +he habitually administered in simple doses. Sugar of lead he mixed +largely in his conserves; pulverized human bones he was very fond of +prescribing; and the principal ingredient in his gout-powder was 'raspings +of a human skull unburied.' But his sweetest compound was his 'Balsam of +Bats,' strongly recommended as an unguent for hypochondriacal persons, +into which entered adders, bats, sucking-whelps, earth worms, hogs' +grease, the marrow of a stag, and the thigh-bone of an ox." A good idea of +the things sold to a confiding public as cures for its ills may be +gathered from two verses on Colonel Dalmahoy, a well-known--shall we say +quack--of the past:-- + + "Dalmahoy sold infusions and lotions, + Decoctions, and gargles, and pills, + Electuaries, powders, and potions, + Spermaciti, salts, scammony, squills. + + Horse aloes, burnt alum, agaric, + Balm, benzoine, blood-stone, and dill; + Castor, camphor, and acid tartaric, + With specifics for every ill." + +Metals and precious stones were extensively used in the prescriptions of +bygone doctors. Every metal and every stone was credited with some special +and peculiar virtue which it alone possessed, and it was applied as a cure +for that ailment over which it had influence and power. Bacon tells us, +"We know Diseases of Stoppings, and Suffocations, are the most dangerous +in the body; And it is not much otherwise in the minde. You may take +_Sarza_ to open the Liver; _Steele_ to open the Spleene; _Flowers of +Sulphur_ for the Lungs; _Castoreum_ for the Braine," for each of which +parts it was believed that the specifics named were most efficacious. The +prescriptions of Dr. Bulleyn, in the reign of Elizabeth, are wonderful +examples of how our fathers were physicked. Here are two of those quoted +by Mr. Jeaffreson. The first is + +"_An Embrocation._--An embrocation is made after this manner:--Px. Of a +decoction of mallowes, vyolets, barly, quince seed, lettice leaves, one +pint; of barly meale, two ounces; of oyle of vyolets and roses, of each, +an ounce and half; of butter, one ounce; and then seeth them all together +till they be like a brouthe, puttyng thereto, at the ende, foure yolkes of +eggs; and the maner of applying is with peeces of cloth, dipped in the +aforesaid decoction, being actually hoate." + +Our second is "truly a medicine for kings and noblemen;" it is called an + +"_Electuarium de Gemmis._--Take two drachms of white perles; two little +peeces of saphyre; jacinth, corneline, emerauldes, grannettes, of each an +ounce; setwal, the sweete roote dorsnike, the rind of pomecitron, mase, +basal seede, of each two drachms; of redde corrall, amber, shewing of +ivory, of each two drachms; rootes both of white and red lichen, ginger, +long peper, spicknard, folium indicum, saffron, cardamon, of each one +drachm; of troch diarodon, lignum aloes, of each half a small handful; +cinnamon, galinga, zurnbeth, which is a kind of setwal, of each one drachm +and a half; thin pieces of gold and sylver, of each half a scruple; of +musk, half a drachm. Make your electuary with honey emblici, which is the +fourth kind of mirobulans with roses, strained in equall partes, as much +as will suffice. This healeth cold diseases of ye braine, harte, stomack. +It is a medicine proved against the tremblynge of the harte, faynting and +swooning, the weakness of the stomacke, pensiveness, solitarines. Kings +and noble men have used this for their comfort. It causeth them to be +bold-spirited, the body to smell wel, and ingendreth to the face good +colour." + +The most innocent articles used in the old medicines were fruits, and +herbs, and vegetables. To some kinds special virtues are assigned, and Dr. +Bulleyn's "Book of Simples," is very pleasant reading. "Pears, apples, +peaches, quinces, cherries, grapes, raisins, prunes, raspberries, oranges, +medlons, raspberries and strawberries, spinage, ginger, and lettuces are +the good things thrown upon the board." We are told of a prune growing at +Norwich, and known as the "black freere's prune," that it is "very +delicious and pleasaunt, and no lesse profitable unto a hoate stomacke." +"The red warden is of greate virtue, conserved, roasted or baken to quench +choller." We are also informed that "Figges be good agaynst melancholy, +and the falling evil, to be eaten. Figges, nuts, and herb grase do make a +sufficient medicine against poison or the pestilence. Figges make a good +gargarism to cleanse the throates." + +Some of the Doctor's prescriptions are very curious. He prescribes "a smal +young mouse rosted," for a child afflicted with a nervous ailment. Nor did +he disdain to use the snail in certain cases. He tells us that "Snayles +broken from the shelles and sodden in whyte wyne with oyle and sugar are +very holsome, because they be hoat and moist for the straightnes of the +lungs and cold cough. Snails stamped with camphery, and leven will draw +forth prycks in the flesh." Snail broth is not entirely unknown in some +country places, even at the present time. Bezoar stone and unicorn's horn +were also used in confections. + +Cancer has always been, and unfortunately still is, a terrible and an +incurable disease, and has afforded a fine field for all kinds of nostrums +and specifics which were to produce a "safe and certain cure." One of +these, called a "precious water," was thus composed. "Take dove's foote, a +herb so named, Arkangell ivy with the berries, young red bryer toppes, and +leaves, whyte roses, theyre leaves and buds, red sage, celandyne and +woodbynde, of each lyke quantity, cut or chopped and put into pure cleane +whyte wyne, and clarified honey. Then breake into it alum glasse and put +in a little of the pouder of aloes hepatica. Destill these together softly +in a limbecke of glasse or pure tin; if not then in a limbecke wherein +aqua vitae is made. Keep this water close. It will not onely kyll the +canker (cancer), if it be duly washed therewyth; but also two droppes +dayly put into the eye wyll sharp the syght, and breake the pearle and +spottes, specially if it be dropped in wyth a little fenell water, and +close the eyes after." + +In 1739, the British Parliament passed an Act which is unprecedented in +the annals of folly. A female quack, named Joanna Stephens, was reported +to have effected some most extraordinary cures by the use of a medicine of +which she only possessed the secret. She proposed to make it public for +the sum of L5,000, and a vain attempt was made to raise the sum by +subscription, but only L1,356 3s. was thus raised. An appeal was made to +Parliament, and a commission was appointed to enquire into the subject, +and a certificate signed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Bishops, Peers, +and Physicians, was presented to the House, declaring that they were +"convinced by experiment of the utility, efficacy, and dissolving power," +of the tested medicine, and Joanna Stephens was rewarded with the desired +L5,000. The prescriptions were published, and the following extracts will +suffice to show how easily sufferers from diseases may be, and sometimes +are, gulled. This lucky quack says:-- + + "My medicines are a Powder, a Decoction, and Pills." + + "The Powder consists of egg-shells and snails, both calcined." + + "The Decoction is made by boiling some herbs (together with a ball + which consists of soap, swine's-cresses burnt to a blackness, and + honey), in water." + + "The Pills consist of snails calcined, wild carrot seeds, burdock + seeds, asken keys, hips and hawes, all burnt to a blackness--soap and + honey." + +Our readers will willingly dispense with the directions of how these +dearly purchased medicines should be prepared. Surely + + "The pleasure is as great, + In being cheated as to cheat!" + +In 1633, Stephen Brasnell, Physician, published a small volume entitled +"Helps | for | Svddain | Accidents | Endangering Life. | By which | Those +that live farre from Physitions or Chirurgions | may happily preserve the +Life | of a true Friend or Neigh-| bour, till such a Man may be | had to +perfect the Cure. | Collected out of the best authors | for the generall +good." The following is his prescription for all kinds of poisons:--viz. +"the Hoofe of an Oxe cut into parings and boyled with bruised mustard-seed +in white wine and faire water. The Bloud of a Malard drunke fresh and +warme: or els dryed to powder, and so drunke in a draught of white wine. +The Bloud of a Stagge also in the same manner. The seeds of Rue and the +leaves of Betony boyled together in white wine. Or take ij scruples (that +is fortie graines) of Mithridate; of prepared Chrystall, one dram (that is +three score grains), fresh Butter one ounce. Mix all well together. +Swallow it down by such quantities as you can swallow at once; and drink +presently upon it a quarter of a pint of the decoction of French Barley, +or so much of six shillings Beere. Of this I have had happy proofe." + +There is a much more effective, though a somewhat revolting prescription +for "those with abilitie." "Take," says our seventeenth century physician, +"take a sound horse, open his belly alive, take out all his entrayles +quickly, and put the poysoned partie naked into it all save his head, +while the body of the horse retains his naturall heate, and there let him +sweat well." Our author admits that "this may be held a strange course, +but the same reason that teacheth to devide live pullets and pigeons for +plague-sores approveth this way of sweating as most apt to draw to itselfe +all poysons from the heart and principall parts of the patient's body. +But during this time of sweating he must defend his braine by wearing on +his head a quilt." The quilt is to be made by taking a number of dried +herbs, which are to be made into a "grosse powder and quilt them up in +sarsnet or calico, and let it be so big as to cover all the head like a +cap, then binde it on fast with a kerchief." This is called "a Nightcap to +preserve the Brain." + +There are also curious prescriptions for the stings of bees and wasps, the +"bitings of spiders," of which he says "the garden ones are the worst." He +tells us that the "flesh of the same beast that biteth, inwardly taken, +helpeth much," and that "outwardly the best thing to be applied is the +flesh of the same beast that did the hurt, pounded in a morter and applied +in manner of a poultis." Here is one about that pretty little animal, the +shrew-mouse: "Now the shrew-mouse is a little kind of a mouse with a long +sharpe snout and a short tayle; it liveth commonly in old ruinous walls. +It biteth also very venomously, and leaveth foure small perforations made +by her foure foreteeth. To cure her biting, her flesh roasted and eaten is +the best inward antidote if it may be had. And outwardly apply her warme +liver and skin if it may be had. Otherwise _Rocket-reeds_ beaten into +powder, and mixed with the bloud of a dog. Or els the teeth of a dead man +made into a fine powder." + +The toad comes in for a good share of attention, and Mr. Bradwell gives a +personal anecdote on this subject. He says:--"Myself, while I was a +student at _Cambridge_, was so hurt by the spouting of a venomous humour +from the body of a great toad into my face while I pashed him to death +with a brickbat. Some of the moisture lighted on my right eye, which did +not a little endanger it, and hath made it ever since apt to receive any +flux of Rheume or Inflammation." Some of our readers may think that this +was a fit punishment for having "pashed" the toad to "death with a +brickbat." + +Among the strangest things ever used as medicine must be placed human +skulls. In 1854, Mr. T. A. Trollope gave a short account in _Notes and +Queries_ of a book by Dr. Cammillo Brunoni, published at Fabriano in 1726. +It was entitled _Il Medico Poeta_ (the Physician a Poet), and gives an +account "of the medical uses of human skulls." Dr. Brunoni informs us, +says Mr. Trollope, that "all skulls are not of equal value. Indeed, those +of persons who have died a natural death, are good for little or nothing. +The _reason_ of this is, that the disease of which they died has consumed +or dissipated the essential spirit! The skulls of murderers and bandits +are particularly efficacious. And this is clearly because not only is the +essential spirit of the cranium concentrated therein by the nature of +their violent death, but also the force of it is increased by the long +exposure to the atmosphere, occasioned by the heads of such persons being +ordinarily placed on spikes over the gates of cities! Such skulls are used +in various manners. Preparations of volatile salt, spirit, gelatine, +essence, etc., are made from them, and are very useful in epilepsy and +hoemorrhage. The notion soldiers have, that drinking out of a skull +renders them invulnerable in battle, is a mere superstition, though +respectable writers do maintain that such a practice is a proved +preventive against scrofula." + +This very curious book consists of a "poem in twelve cantos, or +'Capitoli,' as from the fifteenth century downwards it was the Italian +fashion to call them, on the physical poet--a sort of medical _ars +poetica_; and followed by a hundred and seventy-two sonnets on all +diseases, drugs, parts of the body, functions of them, and curative +means. Each sonnet is printed on one page, while that opposite is occupied +by a compendious account in prose of the subject in hand. We have a sonnet +on the stomach-ache, a sonnet on apoplexy, a sonnet on purges, another on +blisters, and many others on far less mentionable subjects. The author's +poetical view of the action of a black-dose compares it to that of a tidy +and active housemaid, who, having swept together all the dirt in the room, +throws it out of the window. Mystic virtues are attributed to a variety of +substances, animal, vegetable, and mineral." + +That delightful work, The Memoirs of the Verney Family, by Lady Verney, +affords some very striking examples of the medical treatment of poor +suffering humanity in the 17th century. Our selections are from the third +volume. + +One of the most extraordinary medicines of this, or of any age, was +without doubt that known as Venice Treacle. In 1651, Sir Ralph Verney was +in Venice, and the Memoirs furnish the following graphic account of this +terrible drug, which was a concoction of the most disgusting materials. +Sir Ralph sends it to Mrs. Isham, for her family medicine chest, and says +"hee that is most famous for Treacle is called Sig{r} Antonio Sgobis, and +keepes shopp at the Strazzo, or Ostridge, sopra il ponte de'Baretteri, on +the right hand going towards St. Mark's. His price is 19 livres (Venize +money) a pound, and hee gives leaden Potts with the Ostridge signe uppon +them, and Papers both in Italian and Lattin to show its virtue." "This +celebrated and incredibly nasty compound," adds Lady Verney, +"traditionally composed by Nero's physician, was made of vipers, white +wine, and opium, 'spices from both the Indies,' liquorice, red roses, tops +of germander, juice of rough aloes, seeds of treacle mustard, tops of St. +John's wort, and some twenty other herbs, to be mixed with honey 'triple +the weight of all the dry species' into an electuary." The recipe is given +as late as 1739, in Dr. Quincey's "English Dispensatory," published by +Thomas Longman, at the Ship in Paternoster Row. "Vipers are essential, and +to get the full benefit of them 'a dozen vipers should be put alive into +white wine.' The English doctor, anxious for the credit of British vipers, +proves that Venice treacle may be made as well in England, 'though their +country is hotter, and so may the more rarify the viperime juices'; yet +the bites of our vipers at the proper time of year, which is the hottest, +are as efficacious and deadly as them. But he complains that the name of +Venice goes so far, that English people 'please themselves much with +buying a Tin Pot at a low price of a dirty sailor ... with directions in +the Italian tongue, printed in London,' and that some base druggists 'make +this wretched stuff of little else than the sweepings of their shops.' Sir +Ralph could pride himself that his leaden pots contained the genuine +horror. It was used as 'an opiate when some stimulus is required at the +same time'; an overdose was confessedly dangerous, and even its advocates +allowed that Venice treacle did not suit everyone, because, forsooth, +'honey disagrees with some particular constitutions.'" For centuries this +medical "horror" was taken by our drastically treated forefathers. + +The treatment was indeed drastic, and we might truly add cruel. Tom Verney +had "a tertian ague and a feaver," and for this he had "only a vomit, +glister, a cordiall, and breathed a vane"--that is, was bled. Another +patient, Sir George Wheler, who had caught a chill after dancing, had all +sorts of "Applications of Blisters and Laudanums," so that his Christmas +dinner at Dr. Denton's cost him "the best part of 100 pounds." For an +eruption in the leg, Sir Ralph Verney was advised to apply a lotion "so +virulent, a drop would fech of the skin when it touched." + +Young Edmund Verney was ill in 1657, and writes to his father, "Truly I +might compare my afflictions to Job's. I have taken purges and vomits, +pills and potions, I have been blooded, and I doe not know what I have not +had, I have had so many things." In 1657-58 the epidemic known as "The New +Disease," proved very fatal, and created quite a panic. The treatment +adopted by the doctors may be gathered from a prescription of Dr. +Denton's, one of the most famous physicians of the time. He writes to Sir +Ralph Verney, "I see noe danger of Wm. R., and if he had followed your +advice by taking of a vomit, and if that had not done it, then to have +beene blooded, I beleeved he had beene well ere this." Then he adds "It is +the best thinge and the surest and the quickest he can yet doe, therefore +I pray lett him have one yett. 3 full spoonfulls of the vomitage liquor in +possitt drinke will doe well, and he may abide 4 the same night when he +goes to rest; let him take the weight of vi{ds} of diascordium the next +day or the next but one; he may be blooded in the arm about 20 ounces." + +Some of the ladies of the time did not, however, approve of this kind of +treatment, and preferred their own remedies, or their own notions of +remedies, to the doctor's prescriptions. We select two examples. Lady +Fanshawe described the disease as "a very ill kind of fever, of which many +died, and it ran generally through all families." While she suffered from +it she ate "neither flesh, nor fish, nor bread, but sage possett drink, a +pancake or eggs, or now and then a turnip or carrott." But Lady Hobart +ventured to prescribe. She writes, "If you have a new dises in your town +pray have a car of yourself, and goo to non of them; but drink good ale +for the gretis cordall that is: I live by the strength of your malt." Few, +we anticipate, would object to her ladyship's advice, and most would +prefer her "good ale" to Dr. Denton's "vomitts," and the loss of 20 ounces +of blood. + +Our illustrations might be indefinitely multiplied, but those given will +amply suffice to show the way in which our fathers were physicked. + + + + +Medical Folk-Lore. + +BY JOHN NICHOLSON. + + +To ease pain and endeavour to effect a cure, man will try every suggested +remedy, likely and unlikely, and when numberless things have been tried, +each of which was alleged to be a certain cure, he reverts to some simple +thing, taught him by his old grandmother, or the "wise woman" of his early +days; and which, by reason of its simplicity, had been at first +contemptuously rejected in favour of more complex but inefficacious +compounds. There is scarcely a market but has a stall kept by a herb +woman, who, in warm old-fashioned hood, with a little shawl round her +shoulders, her ample waist encircled by broad tapes from which is +suspended a pocket, capacious and indispensable, lays out with great care +her stock of simples--roots, leaves, or flowers, studiously gathered at +the proper time, when their virtue is strongest. Here may be seen poppy +heads for fomentation, dandelion roots for liver complaint, ground ivy for +rheumatism, celandine for weak eyes, and other herbs, all "for the +service of man," to alleviate or cure some of the "ills that flesh is heir +to." She can relate wondrous tales of marvellous cures wrought by her +wares, of cases, long standing, and given up by the duly qualified medical +fraternity, a brotherhood she holds in contempt because of their +new-fangled remedies and methods. + +This chapter, however, deals chiefly with superstitious remedies, or at +least those remedies which seem to have no scientific bearing on the case; +thus, a person having a sty on the eye, will have it rubbed with a wedding +ring, or the gold ring of a young maiden; or cause it to be well brushed +seven times with a black cat's tail, if the cat were willing. Another cure +is more efficacious if administered as a surprise. The patient is placed +in front of the operator, who unexpectedly spits on the eye affected; +which action often leads to angry remonstrance, met by derisive laughter, +which causes, it may be, broken friendship and general unpleasantness for +a time. + +It is a common belief, almost world-wide in its extent, that toothache is +caused by a little worm which gnaws a hole in the tooth. Not long ago I +was shewn a large molar, which when _in situ_ had caused its owner great +pain, and he pointed to the nerve apertures, saying, "That's where the +worm was!" Shakespeare, in "Much Ado About Nothing,"[3] speaks of this +curious belief:-- + + "_D. Pedro._ What! sigh for the toothache? + + _Leon._ Where is but a humour or a worm." + +"This superstition was common some years ago in Derbyshire, where there +was an odd way of extracting, as it was thought, the worm. A small +quantity of a mixture, consisting of dried and powdered herbs, was placed +in a tea-cup or other small vessel, and a live coke from the fire was +dropped in. The patient then held his or her open mouth over the cup, and +inhaled the smoke as long as it could be borne. The cup was then taken +away, and a fresh cup or glass, containing water, was then put before the +patient. Into this cup the patient breathed hard for a few moments, and +then, it was supposed, the grub or worm could be seen in the water."[4] + +The following was communicated to the _Folk Lore Journal_ by Wm. Pengelly, +Esq., Torquay, February 1st, 1884:-- + + "Upwards of sixty years ago, a woman at Looe, in south-east Cornwall, + complained to a neighbouring woman that she was suffering from + toothache, on which the neighbour remarked that she could give a charm + of undoubted efficacy. It was to be in writing, and worn constantly + about the person; but, unfortunately, it would be valueless if the + giver and receiver were of the same sex. This difficulty was obviated + by calling in my services, and requesting me to write from dictation + the following words:-- + + 'Peter sat in the gate of Jerusalem. Jesus cometh unto him and saith, + "Peter, what aileth thee?" He saith, "Lord, I am grievously tormented + with the toothache." He saith, "Arise, Peter, and follow me." He did + so, and immediately the toothache left him; and he followed him in the + name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.' + + The charm, being found to be correctly written, was held to have been + presented to me by the dictator. I at once gave it to the sufferer, + who placed it in a small bag and wore it round her neck." + +A Roumanian charm against toothache is to sit beside an anthill, masticate +a crust of bread, spit it out over the anthill, and as the ants eat the +bread the toothache will cease. + +Some believe that if you pick the aching tooth with the nail of an old +coffin, or drink the water taken from the tops of three waves, the +wearying pain may be relieved or cured. In Norfolk, the toothache is +called the "love pain," and the sufferer does not receive much sympathy. + +Some time ago, a man wished to shew me some antiquity he had found, but +his jacket pocket was so filled with odds and ends ("kelterment," he +called it) that he turned all out in order to better prosecute his search. +Among the miscellaneous collection I noticed a potato, withered, dry, +hard, and black; and was informed it was kept as a preventive and cure for +rheumatism. For the same distressing, disabling disease, some people +spread treacle on brown paper, and apply hot to the part affected. + +The following curious passages have been transcribed by my friend, Mr. +George Neilson, solicitor, Glasgow, from the Kirk Session Records of the +parish of Gretna, and are here inserted by his consent, most freely +given:-- + + "GRAITNEY KIRK, _Feb. 11, 1733_. + + Session met after Sermon. + + It was represented by some of the members that the Charms and Spells + used at Watshill for Francis Armstrong, Labouring under distemper of + mind, gave great offence, and 'twas worth while to enquire into the + affair and publickly admonish the people of the evil of such a course, + that a timely stop be put to such a practice. + + Several of the members gave account that in Barbara Armstrang's they + burned Rowantree and Salt, they took three Locks of Francis's hair, + three pieces of his shirt, three roots of wormwood, three of mugwort, + three pieces of Rowantree, and boiled alltogether, anointed his Legs + with the water, and essayed to put three sups in his mouth, and + meantime kept the door close, being told by Isabel Pott, at Cross, in + Rockcliff commonly called the Wise Woman, that the person who had + wronged him would come to the door, but no access was to be given. + Francis, tho' distracted, told them they were using witch-craft and + the Devils Charms that would do no good. It is said they carried a + candle around the bed for one part of the inchantment. John Neilson, + in Sarkbridge, declared before the Session this was matter of fact + others then present. Mary Tate, Servant to John Neilson in Sarkbridge + is to be cited as having gone to the Wise Woman for Consultation." + + + "GRAITNEY KIRK, _Feb. 25, 1733_. + + Session met after Sermon + + Mary Tate having been summoned was called on, and compearing confessed + that she had gone to Isabel Pot, in the parish of Rockcliff, and + declared that the s{d} Isabell ordered South running water to be + lifted in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, and to be boiled + at night in the house where Francis Armstrong was, with nettle roots, + wormwood, mugwort, southernwood and rowantree, and his hands, legs and + temples be stroaked therewith, and three sups to be put in his mouth, + and withal to keep the door close: She ordered also three locks of his + hair to be burnt in the fire with three pieces clipt out of his shirt, + and a Slut, _i.e._, a rag dipt in tallow to be lighted and carried + round his bed, and all to be kept secret except from near friends: + Mary Tate declared that the said Francis would allow none to touch him + but her, and at last Helen Armestrange, Spouse to Archibald Crighton, + Elder, assisted her, and after all the said Francis, tho' distracted, + told them they were using witchcrafts and the Devil's Charms that + would do no good: Mary Tate being admonished of the Evil of such a + course was removed: Notwithstanding her acknowledgments of her fault + she is to be suspended _a sacris_, and others her accomplices, and + that none hereafter pretend Ignorance the Congregation is to be + cautioned against such a practice from the Pulpit." + +Ague used to be much more prevalent than it now is. Drainage and +sanitation have banished many evils, and with the evil, the exorcists' +charm for the banishment of the evil. Charms, rather than medical +remedies, for the cure of ague, are very prevalent. Rider's _British +Merlin_ for 1715 lies before me. It is a thin 16mo. booklet of 48 printed +pages and 42 blank pages, but some of the blank inter-leaves have been +torn out. It is bound in parchment with gilt edges, and has had a clasp, +which has disappeared. One of the interleaves bears this written +charm:--"And Peter sat at the gate of Jerusalem and prayed, and Jesus +called Peter, and Peter said, Lord, I am sick of an ague, and the evil +ague being dismissed, Peter said, Lord, grant that whosoever weareth these +lines in writing, the evil ague may depart from them, and from all evil +ague good Lord deliver us." The following charm is taken from an old diary +of 1751[5]:--"When Jesus came near Pilate, He trembled like a leaf, and +the judge asked Him if He had the ague. He answered, He had neither the +ague, nor was He afraid; and whosoever bears these words in mind shall +never fear ague or anything else." A strange charm for this dreaded +disease was to be spoken up the wide cavernous chimney by the eldest +female of the family on St. Agnes' Eve. Thus spake she:-- + + "Tremble and go! + First day shiver and burn; + Tremble and quake! + Second day shiver and learn; + Tremble and die! + Third day never return." + +A curious anecdote is related of Lord Chief Justice Holt. When a young +man, he, with companions who were law students like himself, ran up a +score at an inn, which they were not able to pay. Mr. Holt observed that +the landlord's daughter looked very ill, and, posing as a medical student, +asked what ailed her. He was informed she suffered from ague. Mr. Holt, +continuing to play the doctor, gathered sundry herbs, mixed them with +great ceremony, rolled them up in parchment, scrawled some characters on +the same, and to the great amusement of his companions, tied it round the +neck of the young woman, who straightway was cured of her ague. After the +cure, the pretending doctor offered to pay the bill, but the grateful +landlord and father would not consent, and allowed the party to leave the +house with hearts as light as their pockets. + +Many years after, when on the Bench, a woman was brought before him +accused of witchcraft. She denied the charge, but said she had a wonderful +ball, which never failed to cure the ague. The charm was handed to the +judge, who recognised it as the very ball he had made for the young woman +at the inn, to help himself and his companions out of a difficult +position.[6] + +In the west of England a live snail is sewn up in a bag and worn round the +neck as an antidote for ague; though others in the same district imprison +a spider in a box, and, as it pines away, so will the disease depart. + +It is a common belief in the north of England that a person bitten by a +dog is liable to madness, if the dog which bit them goes mad. In order to +secure the bitten one from such a terrible fate, the owner of the dog is +often compelled to destroy it. Should he refuse to do so, the friends of +the injured party would probably poison it, The condition peculiar to the +morning following a night of debauchery, is said to need "a hair of the +dog that bit you," which doubtless refers to the means taken to prevent +ill effects following a dog bite. A wise saw from the Edda tells us that +"Dog's hair heals dog's bite." The following incident recorded in the +_Pall Mall Gazette_, Oct. 12th, 1866, shews most gross superstition in +this Victorian age. "At an inquest, held on the 5th of October, at +Bradfield, (Bucks.), on the body of a child of five years of age, which +had died of hydrophobia, evidence was given of a practice almost +incredible in civilised England. Sarah Mackness stated that at the request +of the mother of the deceased, she had fished out of the river the body of +the dog by which the child had been bitten, and had extracted its liver, a +slice of which she had frizzled before the fire, and had then given it to +the child to be eaten with some bread. The dog had been drowned nine days +before. The child ate the liver greedily, drank some tea afterwards, but +died, in spite of this strange specific." + +Erysipelas in Donegal is known as the "rose." It is very common, but can +be cured by a stroker. The following is said to have happened. A nurse of +a Rector had the "rose," and the doctor was called in. After he was gone, +the woman's friends brought in a stroker, who rubbed the nurse with bog +moss, and then threw a bucket of bogwater over her in bed. This treatment +cured the woman, and is said to be generally in vogue, but is not +efficient except the right person does it.[7] In some parts of Yorkshire, +sheep's dung is applied as a poultice for the cure of erysipelas. + +What is more distressing, both to patient and nurse, than whooping cough, +or king-cough, as it is sometimes called? A change of air is deemed +beneficial to the afflicted one, so the mothers of Hull take their +suffering children across the Humber to New Holland and back again. Some +call it "crossing strange water." Other people procure a "hairy worm," and +suspend it in a flannel cover round the neck of the sufferer, in the +belief that as the creature dies and wastes away, so will the cough +depart. This custom seems to be the relic of an old belief that something +of the nature of a hairy caterpillar was the cause of the cough, and Mr. +Tylor, in his _Primitive Culture_,[8] speaks of the ancient +homoeopathic doctrine that what hurts will also cure. In Gloucestershire +roasted mouse is considered a specific for whooping cough; though in +Yorkshire the same diet cure is adopted for croup, while rat pie is the +one to be used for whooping cough. The Norfolk peasants tie up a common +house spider in a piece of muslin, and when the luckless long-legged +spinner dies, the cough will soon disappear. A correspondent of _Notes and +Queries_ states that when staying in a village in Oxfordshire, he was +informed by an old woman that she and her brothers were cured of whooping +cough in the following way. They were required to go, the first thing in +the morning, to a hovel at a little distance from their house, where a fox +was kept. They carried with them a large can of milk, which was set down +before the fox, and when he had taken as much as he cared to drink, the +children shared among them what was left. The _Aberdeen Evening Gazette_ +of 24th August, 1882, tells of a curious superstition in Lochee:-- + + "Hooping-cough being rather prevalent in Lochee at the present time, + various cures are resorted to with the view of allaying the distress. + Amongst these the old 'fret' of passing a child beneath the belly of a + donkey has come in for a share of patronage. A few days ago, two + children living with their parents in Camperdown Street, were + infected with the malady. A hawker's cart, with a donkey yoked to it, + happening to pass, the mothers thought this an excellent opportunity + to have their little ones relieved of their hacking cough. The donkey + was accordingly stopped, the children were brought forth, and the + ceremony began. The mothers, stationed at either side of the donkey, + passed and repassed the little creatures underneath the animal's + belly, and with evident satisfaction appeared to think that a cure + would in all probability be effected. Nor was this all; a piece of + bread was next given to the donkey to eat, one of the women holding + her apron beneath its mouth to catch the crumbs which might fall. + These were given to the children to eat, so as to make the cure + effectual. Whether these strange proceedings have resulted in + banishing the dreaded cough or not, has not been ascertained, and + probably never will be. A few years ago, the custom was quite common + in this quarter, but with the spread of education the people generally + know better than to attempt to cure hooping-cough through the agency + of a donkey." + +The _North British Mail_ for 20th March 1883, among other superstitions in +Tiree, says, "On the west side of the island there is a rock with a hole +in it, through which children are passed when suffering from +whooping-cough or other complaints." + +It is a common belief that if you wash your hands in water in which eggs +have been boiled, warts will make their appearance; also, that the blood +of a wart will cause other warts. Anyhow, if the warts be there, they can +either be cured or charmed away. The writer once had a row of warts, +thirteen in number, on his left arm. He was told by an aged dame, who sat +on a three-legged stool before her cottage door, smoking a short black +pipe, to take thirteen bad peas, throw them over his left shoulder, never +heeding where they went, all the while repeating some incantation, which +has been forgotten. + +Cures are effected by rubbing the warts with something, which is +afterwards allowed to decay. Some rub the warts with a grey snail or slug, +and then impale the poor creature on a thorn; others steal a bit of beef, +not so much as Taffy made off with, rub the beef on the warts, and then +bury the beef. Lord Bacon, in his _Natural History_, says:--"I had from my +childhood a wart upon one of my fingers; afterwards, when I was about +sixteen years old, being then at Paris, there grew upon both my hands a +number of warts, at the least an hundred in a month's space. The English +Ambassador's lady, who was a woman far from superstitious, told me one day +she would help me away with my warts: whereupon she got a piece of lard +with the skin on, and rubbed the warts all over with the fat side; and +among the rest, the wart which I had from my childhood; then she nailed +the piece of lard, with the fat towards the sun, upon a post of her +chamber window, which was to the south. The success was, that within five +weeks' space all the warts went quite away; and that wart which I had so +long endured, for company.... They say the like is done by the rubbing of +warts with a green elder stick, and then burying the stick to rot in +muck." + +In Withal's _Dictionary_ (1608) there is the following couplet:-- + + "The bone of a haire's foot closed in a ring, + Will drive away the cramp whenas it doth wing," + +but Pepys, who tells us the whole of his experience, with comments +thereon, used a hare's foot as a charm for colic. He says:--(20 Jan. +1664-5) "Homeward, in my way buying a hare and taking it home, which arose +upon my discourse to-day with Mr. Batten in Westminster Hall, who showed +me my mistake, that my hare's foot hath not the joynt in it, and assures +me he never had the cholique since he carried it about him; and it is a +strange thing how fancy works, for I no sooner handled his foot but I +became very well, and so continue." + +(22nd.) "Now mighty well, and truly I can but impute it to my fresh hare's +foot." + +(March 26) "Now I am at a loss to know whether it be my hare's foot which +is my preservation; for I never had a fit of collique since I wore it, or +whether it be my taking a pill of turpentine every morning." + +The following newspaper cutting from the _Boston Herald_, 7th February, +1837, is worth preserving:-- + + "Nothing could be more absurd than the notions regarding some of these + supposed cures; a ring made of a hinge of a coffin had the power of + relieving cramps, which were also mitigated by having a rusty old + sword hanging up by the bedside. Nails driven in an oak tree prevented + the toothache. A halter that had served in hanging a criminal was an + infallible remedy for a head-ache when tied round the head; this + affection was equally cured by the moss growing upon the human skull + taken as cephalic snuff dried and pulverised. A dead man's hand could + dissipate tumours of the glands, by stroking the part nine times; but + the hand of a man who had been cut down from the gallows was the most + efficacious. The chips of a gallows on which several had been hanged, + when worn in a bag round the neck would cure the ague. A stone with a + hole in it, suspended at the head of a bed, would effectually stop the + night-mare, hence it was called a hag-stone, as it prevents the + troublesome witches from sitting upon the sleeper's stomach. The same + amulet, tied to the key of the stable door, deterred witches from + riding horses over the country." + +Our forefathers firmly believed in planetary influence on the minds and +bodies of men, and no operation could be performed on any part of the body +unless the planet, ruling that particular part, were propitious. Rider's +_British Merlin_ for 1715, places the name of some part of the body--face, +neck, arms, breast, etc., opposite the days of the month, indicating that +the influence of the planets on that day is favourable to that particular +part or organ. An old proverb says:-- + + "Friday hair, Sunday horn, + You'll go the devil afore Monday morn," + +shewing that these days were unlucky for clipping hair and cutting nails. +The _York Fabric Rolls_[9] tell us that Maundy Thursday, the day before +Good Friday, was termed Shere Thursday, because "in olde faders dayes the +people wold that day _sheer_ theyr heddes and clype theyr berdes and poll +theyr heedes and so make them honest ayenst Easter Day." The same +interesting volume[10] gives the following account of charming away +fevers:-- + + "1528. Bishopwilton. Isabel Mure presented. She took fier, and ij yong + women w{t} hirr, and went to a rynnyng water, and light a wypse of + straw and sett it on the water, and said thus, 'Benedicite, se ye what + I see. I se the fier burne, and water rynne and the gryse grew, and + see flew and nyght fevers and all unkowth evils flee, and all other, + God will,' and after theis wordes said xv Pater Noster, xv Ave Maria + and thre credes." + +The following is a reproduction of a receipt for Yellow Jonus (Jaundice) +copied from an old book in my possession. "A quart of whine (wine), a +penoth of Barbary barck, a penoth of Tormorch (Turmerich), a haporth of +flour of Brimstone for Jonous." + + + + +Of Physicians and their Fees, + +WITH SOME PERSONAL REMINISCENCES. + +BY ANDREW JAMES SYMINGTON, F.R.S.N.A. + + +In the whole range of professional life, or in any section of the +community, there is no set of men so self-denying, sympathetic, +philanthropic, liable to be called at any hour, day or night, and so +hard-worked, as medical practitioners. To begin with, there is first, a +long and expensive course of study, and, often, several years pass, before +a practice becomes even self-sustaining. Those at the head of the +profession attain to large incomes, and make their L20,000 a year. Noted +specialists, in particular, such as the late Dr. Mackenzie, get large +fees; but the majority of the profession conscientiously perform their +laborious and kindly ministrations ungrudgingly and with moderate +remuneration, which, in most cases, is certainly far short of their +deserts. + +This state of matters has prevailed for many centuries, and, taking the +different value of money into account, notwithstanding the advance of +medical science, there is but little change in the scale of remuneration, +whether as to large fees paid by Royal or titled personages, fees by the +middle classes, or by the rural or working population. + +It has been well said, that "the theory and practice of medicine is the +noblest and most difficult science in the world; and that there is no +other art for the practice of which the most thorough education is so +essential." + +Whittier observes:--"It is the special vocation of the doctor to grow +familiar with suffering--to look upon humanity disrobed of its pride and +glory--robbed of all its fictitious ornaments--weak, hopeless, naked--and +undergoing the last fearful metempsychosis, from its erect and god-like +image, the living temple of an enshrined divinity, to the loathsome clod +and the inanimate dust! Of what ghastly secrets of moral and physical +disease is he the depository!" + +Sir Thomas Browne, in his "Religio Medici," says:--"Men, that look no +further than their outsides, think health an appurtenance unto life, and +quarrel with their constitutions for being sick; but I, that have examined +the parts of man, and know upon what tender filaments that fabrick hangs, +do wonder that we are not always so; and, considering the thousand doors +that lead to death, do thank my God that we can die but once." + +This model physician, who said, "I cannot go to cure the body of my +patient, but I forget my profession and call unto God for his soul," in +the same work, finely says of charity:--"Divinity hath wisely divided the +act thereof into many branches, and hath taught us, in this narrow way, +many paths unto goodness; as many ways as we may do good, so many ways we +may be charitable. There are infirmities not only of the body, but of soul +and fortunes, which do require the merciful hand of our abilities. I +cannot contemn a man for ignorance, but behold him with as much pity as I +do Lazarus. It is no greater charity to clothe his body than apparel the +nakedness of his soul." + +His distinguished position, as a physician and an author, demands very +special and reverential mention in these pages. + +Sir Thomas Browne was born in London on the 19th of October, 1605. He died +at Norwich on the 19th of October, 1682, having reached exactly the age of +seventy-seven. His father was a wealthy merchant, of a good Cheshire +family, but died when his more illustrious son was a boy, and his mother +shortly afterwards married Sir Thomas Dutton. After travelling on the +Continent, he settled as a practising physician at Shipley Hall, near +Halifax, for a time, and then moved to Norwich, where the remaining +forty-two years of his life were spent. His library contained vast stores +of learned works on antiquities, languages, and the curiosities of +erudition. He corresponded with the best men of his day, and was often +able to assist them in their various investigations. His friend Evelyn, +alluding to Browne's home, at Norwich, tells us "His whole house and +garden being a paradise and cabinet of rarities, and that of the best +collections, especially medals, books, plants, and natural things." He was +knighted by Charles II. in 1671. + +Throughout the troublous times of the Civil War, the Commonwealth, and the +Restoration, he led a quiet studious life, issuing volume after volume +full of profound, penetrating, and far-reaching thought, set forth in +stately, sonorous, and musical language, the perfect form or style of +which, at times, is only equalled but not excelled by the best cadenced +prose of Milton or Jeremy Taylor. + +His "Religio Medici," "Hydrotaphia or Urn Burial," and "The Garden of +Cyrus," have been my favourites for more than half a century. Of the +latter work, John Addington Symonds has finely and truly said, that "the +rarer qualities of Sir Thomas Browne's style (are) here displayed in rich +maturity and heavy-scented blossom. The opening phrase of his dedication +to Sir Thomas Le Gros--'When the funeral pyre was out, and the last +valediction over, men took a lasting adieu of their interred friends, +little expecting the curiosity of future ages should comment on their +ashes;'--this phrase strikes a key-note to the sombre harmonies which +follow, connecting the ossuaries of the dead, the tears quenched in the +dust of countless generations, with the vivid sympathy and scrutinizing +sagacity of the living writer.... I will only call attention to the unique +feeling for verbal tone, for what may be called the musical colour of +words, for crumbling cadences, and the reverberation of stationary sounds +in cavernous recesses, which is discernable at large throughout the +dissertation. How simple, for example, seems the collocation of vocables +in this phrase--'Under the drums and tramplings of three conquests!' And +yet with what impeccable instinct the vowels are arranged; how naturally, +how artfully, the rhythm falls! Take another, and this time a complete +sentence,--'But the iniquity of oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and +deals with the memory of men, without distinction to merit of perpetuity.' +Take yet another--'The brother of death daily haunts us with dying +mementoes.'" + +I take leave of this, the most notable of English Physicians, by +transcribing the following grand, suggestive, and characteristic passage +from his "Fragment on Mummies":--"Yet in these huge structures and +pyramidial immensities of the builders, whereof so little is known, they +seemed not so much to raise sepulchres or temples to death, as to contemn +and disdain it, astonishing heaven with their audacities, and looking +forward with delight to their interment in those eternal piles. Of their +living habitations they made little account, conceiving of them but as +_hospitia_, or inns, while they adorned the sepulchres of the dead, and +planting them on lasting basis, defied the crumbling touches of time and +the misty vaporousness of oblivion. Yet all were but Babel vanities. Time +sadly overcometh all things, and is now dominant, and sitteth upon a +sphinx, and looketh unto Memphis and old Thebes, while his sister Oblivion +reclineth semisomnous on a pyramid, gloriously triumphing, making puzzles +of Titanian erections, and turning old glories into dreams. History +sinketh beneath her cloud. The traveller, as he paceth amazedly through +those deserts, asketh of her, who builded them? and she mumbleth +something, but what it is he heareth not." + +The medical profession is a noble and pleasant one, though laborious and +often full of anxiety, straining mind and body. The good physician is the +sympathizing, confidential, and comforting _friend_ of the family. He +values the humble gifts and testimonials of gratitude from the poor, even +more than the costly presents of the rich. + +The virtuous poor are always grateful. It can truly be said of the +physician's kind and often gratuitous services to them, in the language of +scripture:-- + + "When the ear heard me, then it blessed me; and when the eye saw me it + gave witness to me; because I delivered the poor that cried, and the + fatherless, and him that had none to help him. The blessing of him + that was ready to perish came upon me; and I caused the widow's heart + to sing for joy." + +Among savages, sorcerers, and magicians, are the medicine men; these are +still represented, in civilisation, by impostors and quacks. Members of +the profession, as a rule, keep themselves posted up in the medical +science of the day, honestly and unselfishly do everything that can be +done for their patients, and rejoice in being the means of their recovery, +far more than in their fee. + +Burton, in his "Anatomy of Melancholy," treating of "Physician, Patient, +and Physick," when astrology, ignorance, and queer nostrums, were then +more in vogue than practical science, says:--"I would require Honesty in +every Physician, that he be not over careless or covetous, Harpylike to +make a prey of his patient, or, as an hungry Chirurgeon, often produce and +wire-draw his cure, so long as there is any hope of pay. Many of them, to +get a fee, will give physic to every one that comes, when there is no +cause, thus, as it often falleth out, stirring up a silent disease, and +making a strong body weak." Burton then quotes the following sensible +Aphorism from Arnoldus:--"A wise physician will not give physick, but +upon necessity, and first try medicinal diet, before he proceedeth to +medicinal cure." + +Latimer thus severely censured the mercenary physicians of his day:--"Ye +see by the example of Hezekiah that it is lawful to use physick. But now +in our days physick is a remedy prepared only for rich folks, and not for +the poor, for the poor man is not able to wage the Physician. God indeed +hath made physick for rich and poor, but Physicians in our time seek only +their own profits, how to get money, not how they might do good unto their +poor neighbour. Whereby it appeareth that they be for the most part +without charity, and so consequently not the children of God; and no doubt +but the heavy judgment of God hangeth over their heads, for they are +commonly very wealthy, and ready to purchase lands, but to help their +neighbour, that they cannot do. But God will find them out one day I doubt +not." + +"Empirics and charlatans are the excrescences of the medical profession; +they have obtained in all ages, yet the healing art is not necessarily the +occasion for deception; nor the operations of witchcraft, charms, amulets, +astrology, alchemy, necromancy, or magic; although it has its mysteries +like other branches of occult science." + +Paracelsus, the prince of charlatans, styled himself "King of Physic," +but, though he professed to have discovered the _elixir of life_, he +humbly died at the early age of forty-eight years. + +We are told of a patient who, instead of the medicine prescribed, +swallowed the prescription! and _Punch_ records an extraordinary case of a +voracious individual who bolted a door, and threw up a window! + +Sydney Smith, on being told by his doctor to take a walk on an empty +stomach, asked--"Upon whose!" But a truce to stories suggested by the +queer nostrums of quacks. + +Empirics, however, often believed in their nostrums, and were, sometimes, +amiable and unselfish. + +In the year 1776, we are told, there lived a German doctor, who styled +himself, or was called, "the Rain-water doctor;" all the diseases to which +flesh is heir he professed to cure by this simple agent. Some wonderful +cures were, it is said, achieved by means of his application of this +fluid, and his reputation spread far and wide; crowds of maimed and +sickly folk flocked to him, seeking relief at his hands. What is yet more +remarkable still, he declined to accept any fee from his patients! + +Dr. Haygarth, of Bath, had a pair of wooden tractors made in precisely the +same shape and appearance as Perkin's metallic ones; and the same results +followed as when the others, which cost five guineas a pair, were used. + +The story is well known of the condemned criminal in Paris, who was laid +on a dissecting table, strapped down, with his eyes bandaged, and slightly +pricked, when streamlets of water set a-trickling made him think, as he +had been told, that he was being bled to death. His strength gradually +ebbed away, and he actually died, although he did not lose a drop of +blood. + +I knew of a gentleman who, when pills to procure sleep were ordered to be +discontinued, lay awake. The doctor made up a box of bread pills, which +were administered as the others had been, and the patient slept, and +recovered rapidly. + +A young medical man fell in love with a young lady patient, and, when he +had no longer any pretext for continuing his visits, he sent her a present +of a pair of spring ducks. Not reciprocating his attentions, she did not +acknowledge the present, upon which he ventured to call, asking if the +birds had reached her. Her reply was--"Quack, quack!" + +Dr. Lettsom, a quaker in the time of George III., near the close of the +last century, had such an extensive practice that his receipts in some +years were as much as L12,000; and this although half his services were +entirely gratuitous, and rendered with unusual solicitude and care to +necessitous clergymen and literary men. Generosity was the ruling feature +of his life. On one occasion he attended an old American merchant whose +affairs had gone wrong, and who grieved over leaving the trees he had +planted. The kind hearted doctor purchased the place from the creditors, +and presented it to his patient for life. + +Pope, a few days before his decease, bore the following cordial testimony +to the urbanity and courtesy of his medical friends:--"There is no end of +my kind treatment from the Faculty; they are in general the most amiable +companions, and the best friends, as well as the most learned men I know." + +And Dryden, in the postscript to his translation of Virgil, speaks in the +same way of the profession. "That I have recovered," says he, "in some +measure the health which I had lost by too much application to this work, +is owing, next to God's mercy, to the skill and care of Dr. Guibbons and +Dr. Hobbs, the two ornaments of their profession, whom I can only pay by +this acknowledgment." + +When Dr. Dimsdale, a Hertford physician and member of Parliament, went +over to Russia to inoculate the Empress Catherine and her son, in the year +1768, he received a fee of L12,000, a pension for life of L500 per annum, +and the rank of Baron of the Empire. + +Dr. Henry Atkins was sent for to Scotland by James the Sixth to attend +Charles the First (then an infant), ill of a dangerous fever. The King +gave him a fee of L6000, with which he purchased the manor of Clapham. + +Louis XIV. after undergoing an operation, gave his physician and his +surgeon 75,000 crowns each. + +Dr. Glynn once attended the only son of a poor peasant woman, ministering +to his wants with port wine, bark, and delicacies. After the lad's +recovery, his mother waited on the doctor, bringing a large wicker basket +with an enormous magpie, which was her son's pet, as a fee to show their +gratitude. + +A thousand pounds were ordered to be paid to Sir Edmund King for promptly +bleeding Charles the Second, but he never received this fee. + +Dr. Mead, in the time of George the First, was generous to a degree, and +like many of his brethren, would not accept fees from curates, half-pay +officers, and men of letters. At home his fee was a guinea. When he +visited patients of means, in consultation or otherwise, he expected two +guineas or more. But to the apothecaries who waited on him at his coffee +houses of call he charged only half a guinea for prescriptions, written +without his having seen the patient. He had an income one year of L7,000, +and for several years received between L5,000 and L6,000, which, +considering the value of money at that time, is as much as that of any +living physician. + +The physicians who attended Queen Caroline had five hundred guineas, and +the surgeons three hundred guineas each; Dr. Willis was rewarded for his +attendance on George III. by L1,500 per annum for twenty years, and L650 +per annum to his son for life. The other physicians, however, had only +thirty guineas each visit to Windsor, and ten guineas each visit to Kew. + +Dr. Abernethy was annoyed by a lady needlessly consulting him about her +tongue. One morning she came, as he was descending the steps from his door +and putting on his gloves. She said:--"Doctor, I'm so glad I have caught +you!" The doctor asked if it were the old trouble. On her saying "Yes," he +told her to put out her tongue. She did so, and he said, "Stand there till +I come," and left her so, in the street, setting out on his round of +visits. + +Once when prescribing nutritious and expensive diet for a young man in +consumption, he observed the look of despair on the young wife's face, and +the evidence of straitened circumstances around; when the lady appealed to +him, asking if there was really nothing else he could suggest for her +husband. He replied:--"When I think of it, I'll send along a box of pills +in the afternoon!" A messenger brought the box. On the lid was written +"One every day," and, on being opened, it was found to contain twenty +guineas! + +He once bluntly told a _bon-vivant_ gentleman to "Live on sixpence a day, +and earn it!" + +Long ago, a friend told me of a lady in Devonshire, belonging to a family +she knew, who read medical books, and at length imagined she had every +disease under the sun. Whenever she discovered what she believed to be a +new symptom, she at once went off to consult different medical men +regarding it, spending several hundreds a year in this way, and all quite +needlessly. At length she confided to her friends that since doctors +differed so widely, and she could obtain no satisfaction as to what ailed +her, she had resolved to go to town and consult one of the Queen's +physicians. + +A consultation was held in the family, and her nephew was sent to explain +matters to the physician, in the hope of his being able to cure her +hypochondria. When she reached town, the street in which the physician +lived was blocked with the carriages of patients. After waiting hours, her +turn at last came. The physician examined her, asked a few questions, then +enquired if she had any friends in town, as he would rather call to see +her when under their roof, and there tell her what he had got to say. She +protested that she was quite prepared to hear the worst--that she had for +long years looked death in the face--that the notices of her death were +lying in her desk, all written out and addressed, only requiring the date +to be filled in, etc. The physician said he was busy--more than twenty +patients were still waiting in the street--he was averse to scenes, and +would much prefer to see her at her friend's house. She still persisted, +and begged of him to tell her all, there and then, on which he +said:--"Madam, it is my melancholy duty to inform you--that there is +nothing whatever the matter with you!" + +This interview fortunately effected her cure, to the great delight of her +friends, who paid the physician a handsome fee. + +Sir Astley Cooper one year received in fees L21,000. This sum was +exceptional, but for many years his income was over L15,000. His great +success was achieved very gradually. "His earnings for the first nine +years of his professional career progressed thus:--In the first year he +netted five guineas; in the second, twenty-six pounds; in the third, +sixty-four pounds; in the fourth, ninety-six pounds; in the fifth, a +hundred pounds; in the sixth, two hundred pounds; in the seventh, four +hundred pounds; in the eighth, six hundred and ten pounds; and in the +ninth--the year in which he secured his hospital appointment--eleven +hundred pounds." + +On one occasion when he had performed a perilous surgical operation on a +rich West Indian merchant, the two physicians who were present were paid +three hundred guineas each; but the patient, addressing Sir Astley, +said:--"But you, sir, shall have something better. There, sir, take +_that_," upon which he flung his nightcap at the skilful operator. "Sir," +replied Sir Astley, picking up the cap, "I'll pocket the affront." On +reaching home, he found in the cap a draft for a thousand guineas from the +grateful but eccentric old man. + +A cynical lawyer once advised a young doctor to collect his fees as he +went along, quoting the following verse to back his recommendation:-- + + "God and the doctor we alike adore, + But only when in danger, not before; + The danger o'er, both are alike requited-- + God is forgotten, and the doctor slighted." + +The following story illustrates the too frequent weary waiting, when hope +makes the heart sick, and also shows on what curious casual incidents the +success of a career may sometimes turn. It has been told in different +ways, and attributed to different men, such as to Dr. Freind, and others; +but, quite possibly, the same or a similar incident may have repeatedly +occurred. I simply give it as it was narrated to me. A young doctor having +graduated with honours, took a house at a high rent in Harley Street, +London. The brass plate attracted no patients; months passed idly and +drearily, and the poor fellow took to drink. One night the door-bell +rang--a servant man, from a lady of title round the corner, begged him to +come at once, as his mistress was dangerously ill, lying on the floor; her +own doctor was out, and he was sent to fetch the first doctor he could +find. The young doctor regretfully thought what a fool he was, for here +was his chance, when he could not avail himself of it; but he would go, +and try hard to pull himself together. + +When he reached the room, he had enough conscience or sense left to know +that he was not in a fit state to prescribe, and exclaiming, "Drunk, by +George!" took his hat and bolted from the house. Next morning he received +a scented note from the lady, entreating him not to expose her, inviting +him to call, and offering to introduce him professionally to her circle! +Before the season was ended, his practice was yielding him at the rate of +some L1500 a year! + +Curiously enough, it is recorded of a British doctor that he once actually +took a fee from a _dead_ patient. Entering the bedroom immediately after +death had taken place, he observed the right hand tightly clenched. +Opening the fingers, he found in them a guinea. "Ah, that was clearly for +me," said the doctor, putting the gold into his pocket. + +It may be remembered here, that the Royal College of Physicians, London, +was founded by Thomas Linacre, physician to Henry VIII., in 1518; and that +the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh was incorporated by Charter +of Charles II., November 20th, 1681. + +As to the fees paid to physicians, we find that Dr. Edward Browne, the son +of Sir Thomas Browne, who became a distinguished physician in London, in +his Journal, under the date of February 16th, 1664, records: "I went to +visit Mr. Edward Ward, an old man in a feaver, when Mrs. Anne Ward gave me +my first fee, 10 shillings." + +In a work entitled "Levamen Infirmi," published in the year 1700, we find +that the scale of remuneration to surgeons and physicians was as +follows:--"To a graduate in physic, his due is about ten shillings, though +he commonly expects or demands twenty. Those that are only licenced +physicians, their due is no more than six shillings and eightpence, though +they commonly demand ten shillings. A surgeon's fee is twelvepence a mile, +be his journey far or near; ten groats to set a bone broke or out of +joint; and for letting blood one shilling; the cutting off or amputation +of any limb is five pounds, but there is no settled price for the cure." + +Till recent times neither barristers nor physicians could recover their +fees by legal proceedings against their clients or patients unless a +special contract had been made. In the case of lawyers this custom can be +traced back to the days of ancient Rome. Their services were regarded as +being gratuitously rendered in the interests of friendship and justice, +and of a value no money could buy. The acknowledgment given them by +clients was regarded as an _honorarium_, and paid in advance, so that all +pecuniary interest in the issue of the suit was removed, thus preserving +the independence and respectability of the bar. + +Equity draftsmen, conveyancers, and such like, however, could recover +reasonable charges for work done. + +So in the medical profession, surgeons, dentists, cuppers, and the like +were always entitled to sue for their fees; but the valuable services of a +consulting physician were of a different kind, not rendered for payment +but acknowledged by the gratitude and honour of his patients. + +But this code of honour was modified when all medical practitioners were +relieved by the Act of 21 and 22 Vict. 90, which applied to the United +Kingdom, and enabled them to recover in any court of law their reasonable +charges as well as costs of medicines and medical appliances used. This +rule applies to physicians, surgeons, and apothecaries as defined by the +statute. + +The following information is taken from "Everybody's Pocket Cyclopaedia" +(Saxon & Co.). + + +LONDON MEDICAL FEES. + +"Patients are charged according to their supposed income, the income being +indicated by the rental of the house in which they reside. The following +are the charges usually made by medical practitioners:-- + + ----------------------------------------------------------------------- + | Rentals. + |------------------------------------------------ + | L10 to L25 | L25 to L50 | L50 to L100 + ----------------------|----------------|----------------|-------------- + Ordinary Visit | 2s 6d to 3s 6d | 3s 6d to 5s | 5s to 7s 6d + Night Visit | Double an | Ordinary | Visit + Mileage beyond two | | | + miles from home | 1s 6d | 2s | 2s 6d + Detention per hour | 2s 6d to 3s 6d | 3s 6d to 5s | 5s to 7s 6d + Letters of Advice | Same charge as | for an Or- | dinary Visit + Attendance on Servants| 2s 6d | 2s 6d to 3s 6d | 3s 6d to 5s + Midwifery | 21s | 21s to 30s | 42s to 105s + | | | + CONSULTANTS. | | | + | | | + Advice or visit alone | 21s | 21s | 21s + Advice or visit with | | | + another Practitioner| 21s | 21s to 42s | 21s to 42s + Mileage beyond two | | | + miles from home | 10s 6d | 10s 6d | 10s 6d + ----------------------------------------------------------------------- + +"Special visits, _i.e._, of which due notice has not been given before the +practitioner starts on his daily round, are charged at the rate of a visit +and a half. Patients calling on the doctor are charged at the same rate as +if visited by him. + +"There are about 23,000 physicians and surgeons in the United Kingdom, or +one to every 1,600 inhabitants." + +It has been my privilege to know several doctors intimately. Our family +doctor when I was a boy in Paisley, was Dr. Kerr, a man far in advance of +his day. He was the means of introducing a pure water supply to the town +of Paisley, always strenuously urging the importance of sanitary matters +and good drainage, when such things were then but little understood, and +greatly neglected. Shortly after the water had been introduced to the +houses, from Stanley, an old man--who had been accustomed to purchase +water from a cart which went through the streets selling it from a +barrel--on being asked how he liked the new water, replied indignantly, +"Wha's going to pay good siller for water that has neither smell nor +taste?" + +On one occasion, an elderly gentleman, who was slightly hypochondriac, +consulted Dr. Kerr about his clothing, saying that he regulated the +thickness of his flannels by the thermometer. Dr. Kerr, losing patience, +said, "Can you not use the thermometer your Maker has put in your inside, +and put on clothes when you are cold?" + +Dr. Kerr's son and assistant, whom we then called "the young doctor," died +a few years ago in Canada, over eighty years of age. No man could +possibly have been more considerately kind, gentle, and tender-hearted. On +one occasion, in 1841, when, in typhus fever, I was struggling for my +life, he sat up with me for three whole consecutive nights, and brought me +through. He ever kept himself abreast of the science of the day, and +devoted his abilities and energies, _con amore_, to the benefitting of +men's souls as well as their bodies. + +Another model village and country doctor, also an intimate friend of my +parents, Dr. Campbell of Largs, I knew very well. Good, genial, and +accomplished, he was a perfect gentleman, and equally at home dining with +Sir Thomas Brisbane, or drinking a cup of tea at some old woman's kitchen +fireside. He read the _Lancet_, and tried all new medicines, and +repeatedly, when going to London, at his request I procured the most +recent instruments for him. He was intimate with Dr. Chalmers, Lord +Jeffrey, Lord Moncrieff, Lord Cardwell, etc. In telling me of experiments +with Perkin's metallic tractors, and that the same results were obtained +with wooden ones, showing the power of imagination, he gave me a recent +curious illustration. He had lately had the old fashioned little panes of +glass taken out of the windows of his house, and plate glass inserted. +His mother, who did not know of the change, calling one afternoon, sat on +an easy chair, close by the gable window, knitting. On suddenly looking +round she said, "Oh John, I've been sitting all this time by an _open_ +window," and forthwith she began to sneeze! She actually took cold, and +even afterwards could scarcely be persuaded that it had _not_ been an open +window, for she said she felt the cold! The doctor told me of an old +maiden lady who consulted him, and who, when he prescribed in a general +way, insisted on knowing exactly what ailed her. He said she was only +slightly nervous, and would soon be all right. This did not at all please +her, and she at once loudly protested--"Me nervous! There is not a nerve +in my whole body!" + +A West India merchant, one of his patients whom I knew, he also told me, +one day said to him, "Doctor, for forty years I never knew I had a +stomach, and now I can think of nothing else!" + +At the cholera time Dr. Campbell was laid down by the disease. The fact +spread like wildfire over the village, and, at once, prayer-meetings for +his recovery were called by the public bellman, meetings of _all_ the +different denominations, including the Roman Catholics (Dr. Campbell was a +Free Church Elder), and there were truly heartfelt rejoicings in the whole +district over his recovery. + +I once asked him how he managed to get in his fees, since he never refused +to visit when sent for. He said that one year, from curiosity, he kept an +account of his gratuitous visits, and it ran into three figures; but he +never took the trouble to note them again, as it served no purpose. + +Many years ago he went to his rest, and, at his request, during his last +illness, I paid him a farewell visit. + +There are few finer descriptions of the country doctor than that contained +in Ian Maclaren's "Beside the Bonnie Brier Bush," a book which speaks +directly home to every true Scottish heart. + +Dr. Campbell, in his large-hearted and genial Christian charity, +scientific research, and philosophical acquirements, always reminded me of +Sir Thomas Browne, "the beloved physician" of Norwich. + +The following pleasing incident, relating to a medical man, came under my +own notice. I often visited a country minister, an intimate friend, a +learned man, and a genius, the quaint originality of whose observations +often reminded me of Fuller, the Church historian, or Charles Lamb. +Although of limited means, the Rev. Robert Winning, of Eaglesham, was ever +hospitable; if he knew of any poor student, he would invite him to the +manse for a month, on the plea that he would help to prepare him for his +examination in Hebrew and Greek. The old manse servant, also an original, +was paid a sum of money as compensation for refusing tips from visitors. +One day, seeing an advertisement of a new book in a magazine I was +reading, Mr. Winning remarked to me, "Andrew, I wish you would buy that +book, _cut the leaves_, and lend it to me to read!" + +One evening a message reached him from the village inn, saying that a +doctor had come to an urgent case, which required him to stay over night, +that there was no room in the inn, and asking if the minister could give +him a bed. His wife, knowing the house was full, asked her husband what +they should do. His reply was, "Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, +for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Give him a room, +though we have to sleep on the floor." He was accordingly hospitably +entertained. + +Some time after, the minister took ill. The medical guest heard of it, +went to see the local doctor, and, with his consent, visited the minister +twice a week, from a distance of nine miles, and for a period of some four +months, till his death. When the widow afterwards sent for his account, he +said there was none, for it had been more than discharged on the first +evening he had spent at the manse. + +Dr. Stark, of Glasgow, who attended my family for years, was a skilful +practitioner, but eccentric. He generally made light of trifling ailments, +but was most energetic when aroused by any appearance of danger. I knew of +his being suddenly called in to see an old lady who was far gone in an +advanced stage of cholera. He at once asked to be shown over the house, +looked at the different fireplaces, but as none of them suited his +purpose, he went to the kitchen, threw off his coat, took out the range, +made a fire in the recess that would have roasted an ox, had the old lady +carried down in blankets and placed before it, worked energetically with +her the whole night, and brought her through. In a similar way he once +stayed over night and saved the life of one of my boys. One day I called +at his house, and, finding him with a bad cold, eyes red and watery, +throat husky, said, "Doctor, if you found me so, you would prescribe +placing the feet in hot water and mustard, warm gruel, medicine, and going +to bed! Physician, heal thyself!" The doctor's Shakespearian reply was, +"Do you think I am such a fool as to take physic?" + +Once when accompanying me to the coast to visit one of my children, there +was a heavy sea on, and the steamer, on approaching the pier, rolled +alarmingly, and was close on a lee shore. A strange lady on board, in +terror, laid hold of the doctor, a tall, stalwart man, saying, "Oh! sir, +are we going to the bottom?" On which he said, dryly, "Behave yourself, if +you are going there, you are going in good company!" which odd answer +reassured and caused her to laugh. + +In speaking of a Greek gem representing Cupid and Pysche, one day, when +driving in Wigtonshire with the late Dr. David Easton, a medical friend, +he said I had not given the correct pronunciation of the names. Always +willing to learn, I asked to be put right; whereupon, the doctor gravely +informed me that I ought to have said--Cupped and Physic! + +I have spoken of the kindness of medical men, such as Dr. Garth Wilkinson, +to clergymen, artists, and literary men. I add one more expression of +gratitude, which is a good modern instance:-- + +When at St. Helens, in Jersey, during his last illness, my friend Samuel +Lover, the genial poet and artist, wrote the following lines to Dr. Dixon, +his friend and physician. I first copied them some years ago from Lover's +MS. note-book, kindly lent me by his widow when I was engaged in the +preparation of his life. Such cordial tributes are a good physician's most +highly-valued fees:-- + + "Whene'er your vitality + Is feeble in quality, + And you fear a fatality + May end the strife, + Then Dr. Joe Dickson + Is the man I would fix on + For putting new wicks on + The lamp of life." + +From the many varied facts and incidents adduced in these pages, it will +be seen that, in anxiety or sorrow, the good family doctor is a true and +sympathetic friend, whose services can never be paid by gold. + +Next to religion, nothing is more precious or comforting than the sympathy +of those who know and fully understand our sufferings, for, as my old +favourite, Sir Thomas Browne, to whom I ever revert with renewed pleasure, +truly and beautifully says:--"It is not the tears of our own eyes only, +but of our friends also, that do exhaust the current of our sorrows, +which, falling into many streams, runs more peaceably, and is contented +with a narrower channel." + + +Ye Ende + + + + +Index. + + + Abernethy, John, 206-208, 266 + + Advertisements, Curious, 155-159 + + Ague, Charms for, 240-241 + + Akenside, Mark, 109-111 + + Andrews, William, Barber-Surgeons, 1-7; + Touching for King's Evil, 8-23; + Assaying Meat and Drink, 24-31 + + Anne, Queen, 18-19 + + Assay Cups, 30-31 + + Assaying Meat and Drink, 24-31 + + Atkins, Dr. H., 264 + + Axon, W. E. A., The Doctor in the time of Pestilence, 125-139 + + + Banks, Mrs. G. Linnaeus, Some Old Doctors, 192-208 + + Barber-Surgeons, 1-7 + + Barber's Pole, 6, 35 + + Bicycle, 23 + + Birmingham town's book, 15 + + Bisley, 15 + + Bishop, hanged, 167 + + Bishop and Williams, body-snatchers, 171-177 + + Blackmore, R. D., 118 + + Blackmore, Dr., 111-113 + + Black Art, 45 + + Bleeding, 7, 216 + + Blood, Circulation of the, 195 + + Blood in windows, 2 + + Boke of Jhon Caius, 127 + + Booker, Rev. Dr., on small-pox, 163-164 + + Bossy, a quack, 149 + + Brown, Dr. John, 115 + + Brown, Sir Thomas, 123, 124, 253-258, 278, 283 + + Bruce, King Robert the, 209 + + Buddhism, 67-68 + + Bulleyn, Dr., quoted, 219 + + Burke and Hare, 168 + + Burkers and Body-Snatchers, 167-180 + + Burning for disease, 46 + + Burton's "Anatomy of Melancholy," 259-260 + + Byron quoted, 187 + + + Campbell, Dr., 276, 278 + + Cancer, Curious treatment for, 222 + + Carriages, 22-23 + + Celestials and medicine, 58-61 + + Chalmers, John, M.D., 115 + + Charms, 43-44, 52 + + Chaucer's Doctor of Physic, 70-75 + + Chester in plague time, 133-135; + Touching at, 17 + + Cholera, Reminiscences of, 181-191 + + Circulation of the blood, 195 + + Colic, Charm for, 248 + + Cooper, Sir Astley, 170, 179, 268 + + Coryat, 141 + + Cramp, Charm, 52; + Strange cure for, 249 + + Croydon, Cholera at, 185-186, 190 + + Crusade, 209 + + Cumming, Dr. W. F., 114-115 + + Cupping, 217 + + Curious prescriptions, 226 + + + Dickens, Charles, Satires by, 65-66 + + Dickens' Doctors, 90-101 + + Dimsdale, Dr., 264 + + Disinfectants in sticks, 33 + + Disputes between surgeons and barbers, 5 + + Doctor in the time of Pestilence, 125-139 + + Doctors Shakespeare Knew, 76-89 + + Dog bites, 242 + + Douglas, Sir James, 209 + + Doyle, Dr. Conan, 118 + + "Drunk by George," 270 + + + Ecclesfield, 16 + + Edward the Confessor, 8-9 + + Egyptians and Magic, 57-58 + + Elizabeth, Queen, at dinner, 28-29 + + Erysipelas, 243 + + Eskimo Medicine Men, 61-63 + + + Faith Cures, 42 + + Famous Literary Doctors, 102-124 + + Fees, London, 273-274 + + Food taken in fear, 24 + + Freind, John, 196 + + Frost, Thomas, Dickens' Doctors, 90-101. + Mountebanks and Medicine, 140-152. + The Strange Fight with the Small-pox, 153-166. + Burkers and Body-Snatchers, 167-180. + Reminiscences of the Cholera, 181-191 + + + Galen, 120 + + Gallows, superstitions respecting, 249 + + Gild, Barbers', 2 + + Gold-headed Cane, 32-41 + + Grave-mould, 45 + + Greatrake, Valentine, 82 + + Great Plague of London, 136-139 + + + Hall, Dr., 88-89 + + Harvey, Wm., 194-196 + + Heart of Bruce, 210 + + Hentzner in England, 28 + + Hill, Sir John, 114 + + Hodges, Dr., 137 + + Holbein, Picture by, 3 + + Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 106-108 + + How our Fathers were Physicked, 216-233 + + Hunter, John, 198 + + Hunter, William, 199 + + Hunterian Museum, 205 + + + Jaundice, 251 + + Jenner, 159-162 + + Johnston, Arthur, 122-123 + + Johnson, Dr., touched for the evil, 18-19 + + + Kerr, Dr., 275 + + + Langford, J. A., LL.D., How our Fathers were Physicked, 216 + + Latimer on Mercenary Physicians, 260 + + Lee Penny, 209-215 + + Lettsom, J. C., 35, 263 + + Liver, eating human, 51 + + Lockhart, Sir Simon, 211-213 + + Lotteries, 151 + + Lover, Samuel, 282 + + + Macbeth, quoted, 9 + + Mashonaland, Credulity in, 63-65 + + Magic and Medicine, 42-69 + + Manchester in plague time, 135-136 + + Mead, Dr., 265 + + Medical Folk Lore, 234-251 + + Medical Students, 97-98 + + Merry Andrew, 141-151 + + Mercenary Physicians, 260 + + Metals and precious stones used, 218 + + Mountebanks and Medicine, 140-152 + + Mouse, roasted, prescribed, 221 + + Moir, D. M., 116-118 + + Montagu, Lady May, 153-154, 162 + + Monks as surgeons, 1; + forbidden to bleed, 2 + + + Newcastle-on-Tyne, Siege of, 213 + + Nicholson, John, Medical Folk-Lore, 234-251 + + North American Indian medicine men, 52-56 + + + O'Brien, Giant, 202 + + Of Physicians and their Fees, 252-283 + + + Parliament, Folly of, 223 + + Phillips, John, 111 + + Pilgrim's Staff, 32 + + Planetary Influence, 250 + + Plantagenent kings touching for the evil, 10 + + Pontefract Castle, 27 + + Pole, Barber's, 6 + + Preston records, 17 + + + Radcliffe's cane, 33 + + Rain-water doctor, 261 + + Reminiscences of the Cholera, 181-191 + + Revolting prescriptions, 225 + + Richardson, Sir B. W., 202, 204 + + Rings from hinges of coffins, 249 + + Robinson, Tom, M.D., The Gold-headed Cane, 32-41 + + Rochester, Earl of, 144 + + Rheumatism, 238 + + + Sacrificing for disease, 47-49 + + Skull, Human, Medical uses, 227 + + Small-pox, Old receipt for, 72 + + Smith, Sydney, Witty remark, 261 + + Some Old Doctors, 192-208 + + St. Agnes' Eve, 241 + + Stark, Dr., 280-281 + + Statute of Labourers, 124-125 + + Strange Stories, 262 + + Strange Story of the Fight with the Small Pox, 153-166 + + Stuart kings touching for the evil, 12-14 + + Suicide's skull, Drinking from, 50 + + Symington, A. J., Of Physicians and their Fees, 252-283 + + + Tooth-drawing, 5 + + Thompson, W. H., Chaucer's Doctor of Physic, 70-75 + + Thurlow, Lord, on Barbers and Surgeons, 6 + + Thompson, Sir Henry, 115 + + Tobacco, Poet's Praise of, 111 + + Tournament, 186 + + Toothache, Folk-lore of, 235-237, 249 + + Toad, 227 + + Touching for the King's Evil, 8-23 + + Touch-pieces, 11, 20-21 + + Terling, Essex, 15 + + Tudor Kings touching for the Evil, 11 + + + Verney Family, 229-233 + + Visiting Patients, 22-23 + + + Wall, A. H., Doctors Shakespeare Knew, 76-89 + + Walters, Cuming, Magic and Medicine, 42-69; + Famous Literary Doctors, 102-124 + + Warren, Samuel, 116 + + Warts, Charms for, 247 + + Whooping cough, 244-246 + + Wig, 35 + + William III. refuses to touch, 18 + + Winchester, Mountebank at, 147-148 + + Witchcraft, 49-50, 242 + + + York records, 16-17 + + + Zulu doctors, 65 + + + + +FOOTNOTES: + +[1] "Chester in the Plantagenet and Tudor Periods," by Rupert H. Morris, +1894, pp. 78-79. + +[2] The _Asclepiad_, Vol. viii. + +[3] Act ii., sc. 2. + +[4] Dyer's English Folk Lore, p. 156. + +[5] Dyer's English Folk Lore, p. 158. + +[6] _Records of York Castle_, p. 230. + +[7] Folk Lore Journal, v. 5. + +[8] Vol. i., p. 761. + +[9] P. 353. + +[10] P. 273. + + + + +Transcriber's Notes: + +Passages in italics are indicated by _italics_. + +Superscripted characters are indicated by {superscript}. + +The original text contains letters with diacritical marks that are not +represented in this text version. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Doctor in History, Literature, +Folk-Lore, Etc., ed. by William Andrews + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DOCTOR IN HISTORY *** + +***** This file should be named 39514.txt or 39514.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/3/9/5/1/39514/ + +Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images +generously made available by The Internet Archive.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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