Chapter XIV: Quacks and Impostors (1)

Quacks have been in existence so long, have received so much of the confidence of the people, and have afforded such capital to satirists and humourists, that they have become almost a necessity of our existence, from a literary as well as from a domestic point of view. They also add considerably to the revenue, if only through the impost upon patent medicines; for though many may be astonished and horrified to hear it, all patent medicines--_i.e._, all medicines which bear the inland-revenue stamp--are of necessity quack, and although many partisans may endeavour to prove that in the particular case each may select, this is not so, the qualification must fairly be applied, if applied to anything, to all medicines which are supposed to specifically remedy various diseases in various systems, no matter what the peculiarities of either. It can hardly matter whether the inventor of the general remedy be learned doctor or impudent charlatan, the medicine, as soon as ever it assumes specific powers, and is to be administered by or to anybody, is quack, not only in the proper acceptation of the term, but in its original signification. Quacks are, with a few notable exceptions, a very different body now from what they were in the last century, when they killed more than they cured, and when drugs were compounded with a recklessness which seems quite impossible in these moderate days. Just and proper legislation has clipped the wings of the vile impostors who used to trade upon the weaknesses of human nature, and with the exception of those pestiferous practitioners whose advertisements are as noxious as their prescriptions, and who find the fittest possible media for publication, quacks are no longer in existence except as purveyors of patent medicines, pills, ointment, and plasters; and so if there is no cure there is also no kill. Formerly the quack prescribed and compounded, and then he was indeed dangerous, and we cannot better prove this than by means of a remark in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ of July 1734 about Joshua Ward, an advertisement in reference to whom is to be found in the historical part of this book. The paragraph in the old magazine runs: “There was an extraordinary advertisement in the newspapers this month concerning the great cures in all distempers performed with one medicine, a pill or drop, by Joshua Ward, Esq., lately arrived from Paris, where he had done the like cures. ’Twas said our physicians, particularly Sir Hans Sloane, had found out his secret, but ’twas judged so violent a prescription, that it would be deemed malepractice to apply it as a dose to old and young and in all cases.” And again, in the Obituary in the same periodical for 1736, there is an advertisement bearing on this so-called remedy rather unfavourably. It runs thus:--

_Vesey Hart_, Esq. of _Lincoln’s Inn_. About 15 Months ago he took the
celebrated Pill, which had at first such violent effects as to throw
him into Convulsions and deprive him of his Sight. On recovery he fell
into Consumption.

Joshua Ward was rather a celebrity about that time, even among quacks, as the following lines from the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ of July 1734 will show. The heading is--

UNIV. SPEC. ON WARD’S _Drops_.

_EGregious Ward_, you boast with success sure,
That your _one drop_ can _all_ distempers cure:
When it in _S----n cures_ ambition’s _pain_
Or ends the _Megrims_ of Sir _James’_ brain,
Of _wounded conscience_ when it _heals_ the _smart_,
And on _reflexion_ glads the statesman’s heart;
When it to women palls old _M--ar--’s gust_,
And _cools_ ’fore death the _fever_ of his _lust_;
When _F----d_ it can give of _wit_ a _taste_,
Make _Harriot_ pious or _lorima_ chaste;
Make scribbling _B--dg-- deviate_ into _sense_,
Or give to _Pope_ more wit and excellence;
Then will I think that your ONE DROP will save
_Ten thousand_ dying patients from the _grave_.

In the _Daily Advertiser_ of June 10, 1736, there is a puff advertisement for Ward, which runs:--

We hear that by the Queen’s appointment, Joshua Ward, Esq; and eight
or ten persons, who in extraordinary Cases have receiv’d great benefit
by taking his remedies, attended at the Court at Kensington on monday
night last, and his patients were examin’d before her Majesty by three
eminent surgeons, several persons of quality being present, when her
Majesty was graciously pleas’d to order money to be distributed
amongst the patients, and congratulated Mr Ward on his great success.

In the _Grub Street Journal_ of June 24 of the same year is an article on the paragraph, in which it is stated that only seven persons attended at the palace, and that these were proved to be impostors who were in collusion with Ward. The _Journal_ is very strong against the quack, and the article concludes with the following lines, which are in fact a summary of what has been said in the criticism upon Ward’s fresh attempt to gull the public:--

_Seven wonderful Cures._

One felt his sharp rheumatic pains no more:
A Second saw much better than before:
Three cur’d of stone, a dire disease much sadder,
Who still, ’tis thought, have each a stone in bladder:
A Sixth brought gravel bottled up and cork’d,
Which _Drop and Pill_, he say’d, by urine work’d;
But Questions, ask’d the Patient, all unravell’d;
Much more than whom the Doctor then was gravell’d.
The last a little Woman but great glutton,
Who at one meal eat two raw legs of mutton:
Nor wonder, since within her stomach lay
A Wolf, that gap’d for victuals night and day:
But when he smelt the Pill, he strait for shelter
Run slap into her belly helter skelter.

There is no necessity to take trouble for the purpose of discovering the origin of quacks. It is evident that they “came natural” as soon as ever there was a chance for them, and it is but right to suppose that before quackery became a question of money-making, it had an existence, the outcome of a love people have innately for prescribing and administering to each other, relics of which may still be seen in out-of-the-way parts of the country. Some people imagine that quackery and the belief, still current in various parts of Great Britain, that a seventh son, particularly if the son of a seventh son, possesses medical powers, had originally something to do with each other. That quackery in general was caused by this quaint conceit is not to be supposed, yet the belief in the seventh-son doctrine is well worthy of note. The vulgar mind seems from the earliest ages to have been impressed by the number seven, and there are various ways of accounting for this. Chambers, in his “Book of Days,” says that it is easy to see in what way the Mosaic narrative gave sanctity to this number in connection with the days of the week, and led to usages which influence the social life of all the countries of Europe. “But a sort of mystical goodness or power has attached itself to the number in many other ways. Seven wise men, seven champions of Christendom, seven sleepers, seven-league boots, seven ages of man, seven hills, seven senses, seven planets, seven metals, seven sisters, seven stars, seven wonders of the world--all have had their day of favour; albeit that the number has been awkwardly interfered with by modern discoveries concerning metals, planets, stars, and wonders of the world. Added to the above list is the group of seven sons, especially in relation to the youngest or seventh of the seven; and more especially still if this person happen to be the seventh son of a seventh son. It is now perhaps impossible to discover in what country, or at what time, the notion originated, but a notion there certainly is, chiefly in provincial districts, that a seventh son has something peculiar about him. For the most part, the imputed peculiarity is a healing power, a faculty of curing diseases by the touch, or by some other means. The instances of this belief are numerous enough. There is a rare pamphlet called ‘The Quack Doctor’s Speech,’ published in the time of Charles II. The reckless Earl of Rochester delivered this speech on one occasion, when dressed in character, and mounted on a stage as a charlatan. The speech, amid much that suited that licentious age, but would be frowned down by modern society, contained an enumeration of the doctor’s wonderful qualities, among which was that of being a ‘seventh son of a seventh son,’ and therefore clever as a curer of bodily ills. The matter is only mentioned as affording a sort of proof of the existence of a sort of popular belief. In Cornwall, the peasants and the miners entertain this notion; they believe that a seventh son can cure the king’s evil by the touch. The mode of proceeding usually is to stroke the part affected thrice gently, to blow upon it thrice, to repeat a form of words, and to give a perforated coin, or some other object, to be worn as an amulet. At Bristol, about forty years ago, there was a man who was always called ‘doctor’ simply because he was the seventh son of a seventh son. The family of the Joneses of Muddfi, in Wales, is said to have presented seven sons to each of many successive generations, of whom the seventh son always became a doctor--apparently from a conviction that he had an inherited qualification to start with. In Ireland, the seventh son of a seventh son is believed to possess prophetical as well as healing power. A few years ago a Dublin shopkeeper finding his errand-boy to be generally very dilatory in his duties, inquired into the cause, and found that the boy, being the seventh son of a seventh son, his services were often in requisition among the poorer neighbours, in a way that brought in a good many pieces of silver. Early in the present century there was a man in Hampshire, the seventh son of a seventh son, who was consulted by the villagers as a doctor, and who carried about with him a collection of crutches and sticks, purporting to have once belonged to persons whom he had cured of lameness. Cases are not wanting, also, in which the seventh daughter is placed upon a similar pinnacle of greatness. In Scotland the spaewife or fortune-teller frequently announces herself as the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, to enhance her claims to prophetic power. Even so late as 1851, an inscription was seen on a window in Plymouth, denoting that a certain doctress was the third seventh daughter!--which the world was probably intended to interpret as the seventh daughter of the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter. . . . . France, as well as our own country, has a belief in the seventh-son mystery. The _Journal de Loiret_, a French provincial newspaper, in 1854 stated that, in Orleans, if a family has seven sons and no daughter, the seventh is called a _Marcou_, is branded with a fleur-de-lis, and is believed to possess the power of curing the king’s evil. The Marcou breathes on the part affected, or else the patient touches the Marcou’s fleur-de-lis. In the year above named there was a famous Marcou in Orleans named Foulon; he was a cooper by trade, and was known as ‘le beau Marcou.’ Simple peasants used to come to visit him from many leagues in all directions, particularly in Passion-week, when his ministrations were believed to be most efficacious. On the night of Good Friday, from midnight to sunrise, the chance of cure was supposed to be especially good, and on this account four or five hundred persons would assemble. Great disturbances hence arose; and as there was evidence, to all except the silly dupes themselves, that Foulon made use of their superstition to enrich himself, the police succeeded, but not without much opposition, in preventing these assemblages. In some of the states of Germany there used formerly to be a custom for the reigning prince to stand sponsor to a seventh son (no daughter intervening) of any of his subjects. Whether still acted upon is doubtful; but there was an incident lately which bore on the old custom in a curious way. A West-Hartlepool newspaper stated that Mr J. V. Curths, a German, residing in that busy colliery town, became, towards the close of 1857, the father of one of those prodigies--a seventh son. Probably he himself was a Saxe-Gothan by birth; at any rate he wrote to the Prince Consort, reminding him of the old German custom, and soliciting the honour of his Royal Highness’s sponsorship to the child. The Prince was doubtless a little puzzled by this appeal, as he often must have been by the strange appeals made to him. Nevertheless, a reply was sent in the Prince’s name, very complimentary to his countryman, and enclosing a substantial souvenir for the little child; but the newspaper paragraph is not sufficiently clear for us to be certain whether the sponsorship really was assented to, and, if so, how it was performed.” It is not at all likely, proud as the late Prince was of his countrymen, and of Germans generally, that he took upon himself the pains and penalties of sponsorship to this miraculous infant, whose father was doubtless well satisfied with the douceur he received, and never expected even that.

Saffold was an early humbug who depended mainly upon doggerel rhyme for attraction. It is to be hoped that his wares were better than his numbers, or else the deaths of many must have lain heavy on his soul. One of his bills, enumerating his address and claims upon the attention of the public, informs us that of him

_The Sick may have Advice for Nothing,_
And good Medicines cheap, if so they please
For to cure any curable Disease.
It’s _Saffold’s_ Pills, much better than the Rest,
Deservedly have gained the Name of best
In curing by the Cause, quite purging out
Of Scurvy, Dropsie, Agues, Stone and Gout.
The Head, Stomach, Belly and the Reins, they
Will cleanse and cure, while you may work or play.
His Pills have often, to their Maker’s Praise,
Cur’d in all Weathers, yea, in the Dog-Days.
In short, no purging Med’cine is made, can
Cure more Diseases in Man or Woman,
Than his cheap Pills, but three Shillings the Box.
Each Box contains Thirty-six Pills I’m sure.
As good as e’er were made Scurvy to cure.
The half Box eighteen Pills, for eighteen Pence,
Tho’ ’t is too cheap, in any Man’s own Sense.

At the foot of the bill, after a lot of puffery, he breaks out into rhyme once more:--

Some envious Men being griev’d may say,
What needs Bills thus still be given away?
Answer: New People come to London every Day.
Believing Solomon’s Advice is right,
I will do what I do with all my might.
Also, unless an English Proverb lies
Practice brings Experience and makes wise.
Experimental Knowledge, I protest,
In lawful Arts and Science is the best,
Instead of _Finis_ Saffold ends with Rest.

Another of his bills, which were various and plentiful, began thus:--

Dear Friends, let your Disease be what God will,
Pray to Him for a Cure, try Saffold’s Skill;
Who may be such a healing Instrument,
As will cure you to your own Heart’s Content.
His Medicines are cheap and truly good.
Being full as safe as your daily Food--
Saffold he can do what may be done, by
Either Physick or true Astrology.
His best Pills, rare Elixir and Powder,
Do each Day praise him louder and louder.
Dear Countrymen, I pray be you so wise
When Men backbite him, believe not their Lies,
But go, see him, and believe your own Eyes.
Then he will say you are honest and kind.
Try before you judge and speak as you find.

At another time the muse informs us, among other things in connection with the great Saffold, that

He knows some who are Knaves in Grain,
And have more Gall and Spleen than Brain,
Will ill reward his Skill and Pain.

He hath practised Astrology above 15 Years, and hath License to
practise Physick, and he thanks God for it, hath great Experience and
wonderful Success in both those Arts, giving to doubtful People and by
God’s Blessing, cureth the Sick of any Age or Sex or Distemper though
given over by Others, and never so bad (if curable); therefore let
none despair of a Cure, but try him.

Yet some conceited Fools will ask how he came to be able to do such
great Cures, and to foretell such strange Things, and to know how to
make such rare and powerful Medicines, as his best _Pills_, _Elixir_
and _Diet Drinks_ are, and wherefore he doth publish the same in
Print? But he will answer such dark Animals thus:

It hath so pleased God, the King of Heaven,
Being He to him hath Knowledge given,
And in him there can be no greater Sin,
Than to hide his Talent in a Napkin.
His Candle is Light and he will not under
A Bushel put it, let the World wonder:
Though he be traduced by such like Tools,
As have Knaves’ Hearts, Lackbrains are Fools.

☞ ^I request a favourable Construction upon this Publick way of
Practice^ (^And^ _as I am a Graduate Physician_) _should wholly omit
to appear in Print, as well in this Disease as I have at all Times in
all other Diseases, only in Opposition to the Ignorant, that pretend
to Cure, and to prevent the ruine of them that suffer and I see daily
throw themselves upon ignorant and outlandish Pretenders and others,
to the Patient’s utter ruine of Body and Purse_. AND _upon this
Consideration alone, I was persuaded rather to adventure the censure
of_ some, than conceal that which may be of great use to many.

One other specimen of this artist’s verse and we will let him follow his predecessors. It may be as well to mention that when Saffold left the scene of his labours, “his mantle” was supposed to fall on one John Case, who followed in his footsteps so closely that the lines which had done for one quack were often made to do for the other.

Saffold resolves, as in his Bills exprest,
When asked in good Earnest, not in Jest;
He can cure when God Almighty pleases,
But cannot protect against Diseases.
If Men will live intemperate and sin,
He cannot help ’t if they be sick agen.
This great Truth unto the World he will tell
None can cure sooner, who cures half so well.

Dr John Case was a contemporary of Dr Radcliffe, and a noted quack who united the professions of an astrologer and a physician. He took the house in which Lilly had resided, and over his door was a vile distich which was said to have brought him more money than Dryden earned by all his works. Upon his pill-boxes he placed the following curious rhyme:--

Here’s 14 Pills for 3 Pence
Enough is every Man’s own Con-sci-ence.

It is almost impossible to find out when quacks were not, and as we have before remarked, as long as there have been advertisements, whether in newspapers or elsewhere, these cunning rogues have been fully awake to their advantages and uses. One effusion, published as a handbill in the time of William and Mary, is noticeable, as, though the advertisers call themselves physicians, there is reason to doubt their right to the title, and to believe that the college was anything but what we now understand by the word. The bill proclaims itself as an

ADVERTISEMENT.

The Physitians of the Colledge, that us’d to consult twice a Week for
the benefit of the Sick at the Consultation House, at the Carved Angel
and Crown in King-street, near Guildhall, meet now four times a Week;
and therefore give Publick Notice, that on Mondays, Wednesdays,
Thursdays and Fridays, from two in the afternoon till six, they may be
advised by the known Poor, and meaner Families for nothing; and that
their Expectations and Demands from the middle Rank shall be moderate:
but as for the Rich and Noble, Liberality is inseparable from their
Quality and Breeding.

This is, to say the least, peculiar, the quaint use of the word “advised” seeming very strange, while the wind-up shows that whoever and whatever the physicians may have been, they were not likely to lose sight of the main chance. But their notice is feeble compared with another handbill of the same period, which is of the most dogmatic order, and is called

_A friendly and seasonable Advertisement concerning the Dog-days, by_
Nath. Merry, Philo-Chim.

In regard that there are many that perish in and about this City, &c.
through an evil custom, arising from a false opinion That it is not
safe to take Physick in the Extreams of Heat and Cold or in the Dog
days; and some exclude old People, Women with Child and little
Children, from the use of Medicine; which is as much as to say, That
God hath ordained no Medicine for such Times and such Ages, which
would be absurd to imagine, seeing we know there is no Time, Age nor
Disease exempted from proper homogenial and effectual Means (with
God’s Blessing) only against Death there is no Medicine, the Time of
which to us is uncertain. From the aforesaid Mistakes many labour
under the tyranny of their Diseases, till the Catastrophe end in Death
(before the Time come which they have alotted for their Cure) which
might by timely and suitable Remedies be prevented. It’s granted _pro
confesso_ that there is a sort of _Dogmatical Medicines_, that is
unfit to be exhibited in those Times, and are not innocent at any
Time, being impregnated with venomenous Beams, which by their virulent
Hostility invade the vital Œconomy of the Body. But you may have
Archeal or Vital medicines, truly adapted for all Times; being
divested of their Crudities and heterogene Qualities, by a true
Separation of the pure from the impure, and impregnated with Beams of
Light, which give their Influences and refreshing Glances upon the
vital Faculties, expels Venoms, alters Ferments, co-unites with Nature
and re-unites its powers to their due Œconomy, and such Medicines
being most natural and most powerful in the most deplorable Diseases
being timely taken are most effectual, and are no more to be omitted
at any time than foods, and are altogether as safe.

And so on at length, until Nath. Merry divulges the secret that he is the man for the dog-days, and that all others are impostors, which in common with many remarks of the kind, found in most advertisements of the same and other times issued by pretended curers of all known and many unknown disorders, lead us to the belief that however willing quacks have always been to impose upon the credulous themselves, they have been careful enough to expose the presumption of their rivals: a merciful dispensation of providence, which has enabled the statements of one rogue to be balanced, and to a certain extent neutralised, by those of another, and so the remedy is found in the disease when at its worst. Had it not been for the attacks made by empirics upon each other throughout the last century, qualified medical men would have stood a very bad chance, and as it is they seem to have often been obliged to join the ranks of the rascals from sheer inability to get a living without pandering to the popular taste for infallible remedies and things generally unknown to the pharmacopœia. Here is the commencement of an appeal made just prior to the year 1700 by one quack, which consists in a warning against all others of the same profession, and which shows how anxious the writer is for the public benefit, except where his own is immediately concerned:--

A CAUTION TO THE UNWARY.

’Tis generally acknowledged throughout all Europe, that no Nation has
been so fortunate in producing such eminent Physicians, as this
Kingdom of ours; and ’tis as obvious to every Eye, that no Country was
ever pestered with so many ignorant Quacks or Empirics. The Enthusiast
in Divinity having no sooner acted his Part, and had his _Exit_, but
on the same Stage, from his Shop (or some worse Place) enters the
Enthusiast in Physicks: yesterday a Taylor, Heelmaker, Barber, Serving
Man, Rope Dancer, etc., to-day _per saltum_ a learned Doctor, able to
instruct Esculapius himself, for he never obliged Mankind yet with a
_Panacæa_, an universal Pill or Powder that could cure all Diseases,
which now every Post can direct you to, though it proves only the
Hangman’s Remedy for all Diseases by Death. _Pudet hæc opprobria
dici_; for shame, my dear Countrymen, reassume your Reasons, and
expose not your Bodies and Purses to the handling of such illiterate
Fellows, who never had the Education of a Grammar-School, much less of
an University.

Nor be ye so irrational as to imagine anything extraordinary (unless
it be Ignorance) in a Pair of outlandish Whiskers, tho’ he’s so
impudent to tell you he has been Physician to 3 Emperours and 9 Kings
when in his own Country he durst not give Physick to a Cobbler.

Nor be gulled with another sort of Impostor, who allures you to him
with CURE WITHOUT MONEY, but when he once has got you into his
Clutches, he handles you as unmercifully as he does unskilfully.

Nor be ye imposed on by the Pretence of any _Herculean_ Medicine, that
shall with four Doses at 5s. a Dose, cure the most inveterate
Complaint, and Distempers not to be eradicated (in the Opinion of the
most learned in all Ages) with less than a Renovation of all the
Humours in the whole Body.

These and the like Abuses (too numerous here to be mentioned) have
induced me to continue this public Way of Information, that you may be
honestly dealt with, and perfectly cured, repairing to him, who with
God’s Blessing on his Studies and 20 Years successful Practice in this
City of London hath attained to the easiest and speediest way of
curing.

Then follows the puff which this disinterested person gives to his own wares and powers, and if it is to be believed, he certainly proves to demonstration that he is as good as the others are bad. The next item we have is a bill of the early eighteenth century, headed by a rude woodcut of a unicorn’s horn. There is no address on it, and it looks as though used while travelling round the country, in which case the High-German’s lodging for the time being would be written or printed on the back, or supplemented in one of the ways usual among itinerant charlatans:--

_The High-German, Master of the Waxwork,_

Hath an Unicorn’s Horn that was found in the Deserts of Arabia, the
Powder whereof does several wonderful Cures, whereof I was advised by
several Doctors to Publish the same in Print; the Cures that it has
done are as follow:

I have in my Travels, by the Virtues of this Powder, saved the Lives
of several Gentlewomen in Child-Bed, which could not be Delivered
before they took the Powder.

About October the Fifth, 1702, I was in the Town of Hampton, in the
County of Gloucester, at Mr Gardners, at the Sign of the White-Hart,
where I heard that one Mrs Webb was in Child-Bed and could not be
Delivered, so that Doctor Farr of the said Town, the Midwife and all
Women left her off for Dead, upon which I sent my Landlady with a
little of this Powder, the Quantity whereof would lie upon a
Six-pence, which the Gentlewoman took, and was Delivered in less than
a Quarter of an Hour; Doctor Farr has given it under his Hand, and
some other Gentlemen of the Town can testify, that this Powder was the
saving of her Life (under God).

Likewise this Powder is a certain Cure for the Kings-Evil, when it
breaks and runs: The Powder must be put on a Linnen Cloath and applied
to the Place, and take as much as will lie on a Six-pence for two
Mornings in warm Ale.

The College of Physitians in London, hearing of this Powder, they came
to my Lodging, on purpose to see this Horn, and desired me to let them
have some Experience to try if it would Expel Poyson, upon which they
sent for two Dogs and Poysoned them both, and asked me if I could save
one of them, whereupon I took a little Powder of this Horn in a
Spoonful of Milk, and gave it to one of them, that which I gave it to
was saved, and the other died in their Presence, after which the
Doctors offered me a great Sum of Money for this Horn, which I was not
willing to part with.

If there are any Gentlewomen desirous to Buy any of this Powder, I
Sell it at Reasonable Rates, and it may be kept Ten Years and not lose
its Virtue.

FINIS.

In Queen Anne’s time, and during the first years of the Hanoverian succession, quackery does not seem to have impaired its professors’ positions in society, providing they had other claims to consideration, and even the most impudent impostors obtained rank and celebrity under circumstances which hardly seem possible. Listen to the following: “Sir William Read, originally a tailor or a cobbler, became progressively a mountebank and a quack doctor, and gained, in his case, the equivocal honour of knighthood from Queen Anne. He is said to have practised by ‘the light of nature:’ and though he could not read, he could ride in his own chariot, and treat his company with good punch out of a golden bowl. He had an uncommon share of impudence; a few scraps of Latin in his bills made the ignorant suppose him to be wonderfully learned. He did not seek his reputation in small places, but practised at that high seat of learning, Oxford; and in one of his addresses he called upon the Vice-Chancellor, University, and the City, to vouch for his cures--as, indeed, he did upon the people of the three kingdoms. Blindness vanished before him, and he even deigned to practise in other distempers; but he defied all competition as an oculist. Queen Anne and George I. honoured Read with the care of their eyes; from which one would have thought the rulers, like the ruled, as dark intellectually as Taylor’s (his brother quack) coach-horses were corporeally, of which it was said five were blind in consequence of their master having exercised his skill upon them.” Dr Radcliffe mentions this humbug as “Read the mountebank, who has assurance enough to come to our table up-stairs at Garraway’s, swears he’ll stake his coach and six horses, his two blacks, and as many silver trumpets, against a dinner at Pontack’s.” Read died at Rochester, May 24, 1715. After Queen Anne had knighted him and Dr Hannes, the following lines were published:--

The Queen, like Heav’n, shines equally on all,
Her favours now without distinction fall:
Great Read and slender Hannes, both knighted, show
That none their honours shall to merit owe.
That Popish doctrine is exploded quite,
Or Ralph had been no duke and Read no knight.
That none may virtue or their learning plead,
This has no grace and that can hardly read.

The Ralph referred to here is the first Duke of Montague, a title that has already appeared conspicuously in these pages. In the matter of the bestowal of titles, especially knighthoods and baronetcies, we have no particular reason to congratulate ourselves now, but we have certainly improved since the days when rank was sold or bestowed upon the most audacious adventurers. So far as merit is concerned, we are, however, much in the same position as we were in the days of Read and Ralph; but ability always was an unmarketable commodity, and now it seems to secure its unhappy possessors the decided enmity of those more favoured beings whose dependence is upon patronage, and not upon personal powers, and who, in humble imitation of the fox of fable, affect to despise any such common thing as cleverness. And unfortunately this observation has a far wider bearing than on the mere bestowal of titles. It refers to things generally, and to the means by which many clever men are deprived of their subsistence, and driven to the wall by the nepotism and friendly feeling so often exercised in favour of the most arrant impostors, or on behalf of those who are just clever enough to conceal their ignorance and inability, to rob others of their ideas, or to foist second-hand notions upon a credulous and misjudging public.

In “A Journey through England,” published in 1723, we get the following picture of a travelling quack of that time: “I cannot leave Winchester without telling you of a pleasant incident that happened there. 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 inquiry I found this great equipage belonged to a mountebank, and 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 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 apiece. 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 brochade nightgown, for his chamber practice, when he gives advice and gets larger fees.”

Although the papers of the early eighteenth century actually teem with the advertisements of quacksalvers, few of the applications to the unwary possess any distinctive features, and those which do are of the grossest possible description. In the _Daily Post_ of July 14, 1736, there is a curious testimonial to the abilities of a City practitioner who advertised very considerably about that period. His advertisements all take the form of recommendations from those who have received benefit at his hands and from his medicines, and the one we have chosen will give a fair idea of the others, which in many cases refer to the disorders of the gentler sex:--

THESE are to certify, that I Richard Sandford, Waterman, dwelling in
Horsely-down-street, near the Dipping Pond, have a Son, who for a
considerable Time was troubled with a _Pain in his Stomach, a
Sleepiness and Giddiness_, whereupon I calling to Mind that some Years
since my Wife’s Mother, betwixt 60 and 70 years of Age, _afflicted
with a Palsy or Hemeplegia, or loss of the Use of one Side of her
Body, had been cured by_

_Mr._ JOHN MOORE, _Apothecary_,

_At the Pestle and Mortar in Laurence-Pountney’s Lane, the first Great
Gates on the Left-Hand from Cannon-street,_

I applied to him for Relief of my Son, who after having taken a few of
his Worm-Powders, they brought from him a WORM (or INSECT) like a
Hog-Louse, with Legs and hairy, or a Kind of Down all over it, and
very probably more, but he going to a common Vault they were lost;
upon which he is amended as to his former Illnesses, and I desire this
may be printed for the Good of others.

Witness

RICHARD SANDFORD.

_Oct. 6, 1735._

N.B. The said JOHN MOORE’S Worm Medicines and Green-Sickness Powder,
are sold at Mrs. Reader’s at the Nine Sugar-Loaves, a Chandler’s Shop
in Hungerford-Market, sealed with his Coat of Arms, being a Cross,
with the Words, _John Moore’s Worm-Powders_, &c., inscribed round it:
And if any are Sold at any place, except at his own House, without
that Seal and Inscription, they are Counterfeits.

He sells Byfield’s Sal Volatile Oliosum, at 6d. per Ounce.

To be had at the said J. Moore’s,

COLUMBARIUM; or, The Pigeon-House: Being an Introduction to a Natural
History of Tame Pigeons, giving an Account of the several Species
known in England, with the Method of breeding them, their Distempers
and Cures.

_The two chief Advantages, which a real Acquaintance with Nature
brings to our Minds, are first, by instructing our Understandings and
gratifying our Curiosities; and next by exciting and cherishing our
Devotion._

Boyle’s Experimental Philosophy, p. 3.

Mr Sandford’s ideas on natural history were rather confused, and his powers of description evidently bothered by the astonishing “insect” which had so annoyed his son. What a pity so curious a specimen was not preserved for the benefit of Moore and “the good of others”! There was now a sore battle being fought between the quacks and the regular practitioners, the latter being bound to come forward and defend what they considered to be their rights by all and every means. That they did not disdain the use of advertisements, the following, which had its origin in a small gossiping paragraph, shows. It appears in the _Daily Journal_ of July 22, 1734, but was originally published a few days before, without the two paragraphs after signature:--

WHEREAS in the Papers of Saturday last there was a Paragraph relating
to a Dispute that happened at Child’s Coffee-house, between a Doctor
and a Surgeon; I think it my Duty to tell the Fact that occasioned
this Dispute, truly as it is.

On Wednesday the 10th of July I sent to Mr. Nourse; when he came I
told him I had a Swelling and great Pain in my Leg; he saw it, said it
was much inflamed, and that I must be blooded, take some Physick, and
that he would send something that was proper to be applied; I was
immediately let Blood; and he writ a Purge for me, to be taken the
next Day, which I took, and am thereby, I thank God, much better.
Afterwards, in the same Conversation, he ask’d me how long I had been
ill? my Answer was, ten Days; he reply’d, have you been ill so long,
and had no Advice? I then told him, I had, some Days before, been to
the Jew Doctor’s House; his Answer was, I suppose you mean Dr.
Schamberg, and pray what has he ordered for you? I said, I could not
tell; but being desirous that Dr. Nourse should see the Prescription,
I sent to the Apothecary’s for it by my Son, who brought it directly
into the Room, where there was not anybody but Mr. Nourse and myself;
Mr. Nourse looked upon the Bill, and told me I must take none of these
Things now; nor the Spaw Water, said I? (for that was Part of the
Prescription); his Answer was No, and laid the Bill down upon the
Table, without saying anything more. This is the whole Truth, and I’m
ready to attest it by an Affidavit.

N.B. When I sent to Mr. Nourse I was determined to apply no more to
Dr. Schamberg, he being in a manner a Stranger to me, and I have been
much worse every Day, from the Time I began to take his Medicines.

B. J. KNIGHT.

Leadenhall Market, 15 July.

The Propriety of Æsculapius’s Prescription judge of by the Effect.

Q. Whether Steel steep’d in Brandy, and Spa Water, are proper for a
Shortness of Breath, or an Inflammation.

After this had been published once or twice, the advertiser, who could hardly have taken so much trouble out of pure gratitude, inserted another notice in the form of an affidavit, containing the foregoing and other particulars, the most important of which is that which discovers her sex. At least we presume that Bridget was a woman’s name in 1734. The difficulties between the doctors and apothecaries--the latter, when not quacks themselves, being their special agents--and the demand made for the far-famed Jesuits’ Bark, are both shown in the following handbill, which is of about the same date as the foregoing:--

WHEREAS it has been of late the Endeavour of several Members of the
Physicians College, to reform the Abuses of the Apothecaries, as well
in the Prizes as in the Composition of their Medicines, This is to
give Notice for the public Good, that a superfine Sort of _Jesuits
Bark_ ready powder’d and paper’d into Doses, with or without
Directions for the Use of it, is to be had at Dr. Charles Goodal’s at
the Coach and Horses, in Physician’s Colledge in Warwick Lane, at 4s.
per Ounce, or for a Quantity together at £3 per Pound; for the
Reasonableness of which Prizes, (considering the Loss and Trouble in
powdering) we appeal to all the Druggists and Apothecaries themselves
in Town, and particularly to Mr. Thair, Druggist in Newgate Street, to
whom we paid full 9s. per Pound for a considerable Quantity for the
Use of our self and our friends.

And for the Excellency and Efficacy of this particular Bark enquire of
Dr. Morton in Grey Friars.

_I am to be spoken with at Prayers at_ S. Sepulchre’s every Day, _but
the Lord’s Day, at Seven in the Morning, and at Home from Eight in the
Morning till Ten at Night_.

_The Poor may have Advice_ (_that is_, Nothing) _for_ Nothing.

“Nothing for nothing” is a rate of exchange which is current even to this day, and was very likely known long before the time of this physician, whose effort could hardly have been expected to prove disastrous to the empirics, as he, among other peculiarities, regards what should have been his strong point of dissimilarity from them as “nothing.” Another bill of the same period is noticeable for the explicitness of the address given in it:--

When you are in _Baldwin’s Gardens_, that you may not mistake, ask for
_Leopard’s Court_, and there at the Sign of the _Moon and Stars_, you
will find the _Louvain Doctor_ from 8 in the Morning till 7 at Night.
As you pass by the end of Leopard’s Court you may see the Sign of the
_Moon and Stars_, which, pray, observe, least you mistake: for there
are several Pretenders, therefore keep this bill. _Baldwin’s Gardens_
are near _Holborn_.

Baldwin’s Gardens would hardly be a good address in these times for even the veriest quack. It is now about the foulest specimen extant of that kind of backslum or alley where, a generation back, according to Hood, pigs and Irish were wont to rally. The pigs, except in the form of hocks, “Jerry Lynch” heads, and other portions of bacon, have been removed by Act of Parliament since the poet sang his simple lay of “The Lost Child,” but the Irish have increased and multiplied with an activity unknown to them in other pursuits. The powers of the finest peasantry in the world are undoubted in one particular of philoprogenitiveness under any circumstances, and they seem to exert them to the utmost when least required and most inconvenient--when they are “pigged up” in small rooms and festering courts, and when every fresh birth is an outrage upon the sanatory laws supposed to govern us, and upon their own sense of decency. We are in the habit of hearing most of our domestic and civic misfortunes ascribed to the higher wages and increased leisure of the labouring classes of the present, as compared with those of twenty or thirty years back. Is this the case with regard to the rapid development of inhabitants for Baldwin’s Gardens, Leather Lane, Saffron Hill, and neighbouring purlieus? There may be increased leisure there, but if the wages are higher now than they were, in proportion to the higher price of provisions, they must have suffered worse than starvation in years gone by. So unhealthily crowded--in fact, pestilent--is the neighbourhood we have mentioned, that no number of quacks could have done more to shorten life than the inhabitants now do for themselves. But even these poor wretches are made the groundwork for a new system of quackery--the quackery of the mock philanthropist, who builds model lodging-houses, ostensibly and with much flourishing of trumpets, for the very poor, and then lets them to people who never did dwell in rookeries; to those people who can afford to pay good rents, and so keep up the dividends which are the modern reward of so-called charity.

Notwithstanding the many stirring events of the early part of the last century, there is little or nothing to read in any of the papers. This may be accounted for by the difficulty of obtaining news from distant or even from any parts a hundred and thirty years or so back; but whatever the reason, this is certain, the advertisements are by far the best reading in the journals, daily or weekly. Though the newspapers were to our notions wonderfully small, their editors seem to have had the greatest difficulty in filling the little space they had at command with news, and provincial journals were sometimes put to strange shifts, even the now common work of the liner, that of inventing facts, being then unknown. It is by no means unusual to find a chapter of the Bible put in to fill up the columns; and even as late as 1740 the _London and County Journal_ gratified its readers with the History of the Old and New Testaments, while other papers filled up their front pages with occasional extracts from the histories of England and other countries, or selections from books of travel. Singular as this may seem, it is true. Its truth is perhaps the most singular thing about it.

Among the many specifics of the last century was snuff, which in various forms is advertised as possessing the power not only of curing all bodily but many mental evils. In the _General Advertiser_ for June 21, 1749, there is an advertisement of a snuff which was supposed to cure lunacy. Certainly it has an effect on the ideas with regard to the construction of sentences, as the proprietor himself shows:--

GENTLEMEN,

ONCE more I desire you to remember, I have published my _Imperial
Snuff_, for all Disorders in the Head; and I think I might have gone
further, and said, for all Disorders of Body and Mind. It hath set a
great many to rights that was never expected, but there is but few, or
none, that careth to have it published they were a little out of their
Senses, although it be really an Ailment that none can help; but there
is present Relief, if not a Cure; but I hope both, as by God’s
Assistance it hath been performed already on many. And I think it my
Duty to let the World know it, that they may not bear so many
miserable Ailments that is capable of curing. I hear it is reported
abroad I am dead, and that the World is imposed on; but, thank God, I
am alive and put my Dependance on him, that he will give me leave to
do some more Service before I go hence. But suppose I was dead, my
Snuff is alive, and I hope it will live after I am dead, as it is
capable of keeping the World in sprightly Life and Health, which must
be allowed to be the greatest Blessing in the World. But what is
Riches without that? And what would some have given for some of these
Reliefs before it was advertised. But you are all heartily welcome at
this Price of Sixpence, at present, but I should be glad of more from
the Rich. I do assure you it is sold at this Price in regard to the
Poor only.

I am yours, etc.

SAMUEL MAJOR.

_In Swedland Court, against the end of Half-Moon-Alley, Bishopsgate
Street._

The next gentleman upon the list is Mr Patence, who combined in himself many valuable qualifications, and was according to his own showing a decided benefactor to humanity. In December 1771 we find the following in the _Gazetteer_:--

MR Patence, Dentist and Dancing Master, No. 8, Bolt Court, Fleet
Street, whose Ingenuity in making artificial Teeth, and fixing them
without the least Pain, can be attested by several of the Nobility,
and hopes to be honoured by the rest of the Great--may depend his
Study shall be devoted to the good of every Individual. His whole
Sets, with a Fine enamel on, is a Proof of his excelling all
Operators. He charges ten Guineas for a whole, five for an upper or
under Set, and half-a-Guinea for a single Tooth.--His Rose Powder for
preserving the Teeth, is worthy to grace and perfume the chamber of a
Prince.--His Medicines for preventing all Infections and sore Throats
have been experienced by several.--As for dancing, he leaves that to
the multitude of Ladies and Gentlemen whom he has taught, and desires
to be rewarded no more than his Merit deserves, nor no less. Public
School nights, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday Evenings; Tuesday
Evenings set apart for Cotillons only.--_N.B._ His Rose Dentrifice may
be had at Mr Nesbit’s Toy Shop Bishopsgate Street, and at his House,
at 2s. 6d. the box.

The conjunction of practices seems somewhat odd, and, as many may think, rather ominous--for the patients. But Mr Patence evidently flourished, and found plenty money to spend in advertisements. He promises much, but his strong point is secrecy. Advice is as usual offered gratis, which was a fair charge for it, considering that the applicant was sure to be advised to buy some of the nostrums purveyed by Patence. By his skill he repeatedly offers to stand or fall, and about the date we have given he publishes the following as evidence of it. It will be noticed that the address has been shifted, possibly on account of increased business:--

No. 3 _Ludgate Hill_.

THIS Week a Lady applied to Mr. _Patence_, No. 3 Ludgate Hill, who had
her Jaw-Bone broke by having a Tooth extracted, by another Lady, with
a sound front Tooth in her Hand, and two others just ready to drop
from their Sockets, by having four wretched artificial ones set in by
another: her Teeth are all loose. By Tincture, a Gentleman with Teeth
set in as brown as a Walnut, that never answered any End; and several
other Persons in different Cases. Mr. _Patence_ therefore begs leave
to add, that it is not his Intent to take away or lessen the Merit of
any one particular Person; but how shocking it is to see Ladies and
Gentlemen imposed on, a good set of Teeth ruined, and left at Leisure
to lament the Loss in Pain, by Pretenders; for, of all Things
artificial Teeth badly set in, is the most destructive of the good
next them: but if performed in that masterly Manner that human Nature
requires, they are a Preservation, and will answer the End which a
humane Man would wish for, or a skilful Dentist desire.--Advice given
daily in Cases ordinary, and extraordinary. No Cure no Pay.

After this Patence goes on merrily telling us now that his “works, cures, and operations confirm his supremacy over every dentist in this kingdom; also physicians, curing man, woman, and child, when not one of them can give relief;” and then that he sells “teeth comprised of six different enamels, warranted never to turn black.” Teeth were, however, but small things in his practice, as he guarantees to replace “fallen noses” and challenges all known and unknown diseases, being, as he states, “mechanically accurated and anatomically perfect in the human structure.” To say less, he tells us, would be “doing an act unjust to himself, his patients, and his Maker, whose gifts are disposed of to whom he pleases.” In the _Morning Post_ of 1775 he publishes the following, having in the meantime once again changed his residence:--

To the _Nobility_, _Gentry_, and Others.

PATENCE, Surgeon by Birth, and Dentist, having had ten Years Practice,
performs every Operation on the Teeth, Gums, &c., with superior Skill,
and whose Cures are not excelled or even equalled by any Dentist
whatever. And as a Confirmation of the same, please to observe the
following:--

October 5. A Gentleman who had lost all his Teeth, his Gums ulcerated
and scorbutic, in five Days made a perfect Cure, fixed him in a whole
set of natural Teeth, without Springs or any Fastening.

October 16. A Lady whose Jaw was fractured by a Barber, her Teeth
loose, her Gums ulcerated, attended with a running Matter, and an
inflammation in her Cheeks, with a callous Swelling, cured without
poulticing or cutting.

October 20. A Lady that had lost all her upper Teeth by using Powders
and Tinctures that are advertised to cure Everything, her Mouth
ulcerated, and her Breath nauseous, is now delicately Clean, and
replaced the Teeth with those that never change their Colour.