take comfort by seeing what they are | brated another triumph of orthodoxy - relatively in the present year of and authority. Authority was the grace. It is common enough at the Juggernaut beneath whose car all the present day to hear sneers at doctors, best and boldest spirits were crushed more particularly when the sneerer is in the sacred name of Religion. in no immediate need of one. Nor can their most devout disciples maintain that they are infallible. Perhaps they never will be, until such time as the human race shall, in process of evolution, develop a sliding door beneath the fifth rib, by means of which its interior derangements may be studied with accuracy. But it may in all truth be said that our physicians and surgeons, as compared with those of classic and mediæval days, are as gods, knowing all things. In almoste al places of studie [wrote Cornelius Agrippa] a damnable custom is growen, in that they binde with an othe the schollers which they receive, never to speak against Aristotle, Boetius, Albert, or any other of their Schollers being accompted a God, from whom if a man differ a finger's breadth in thought, immediately they will call him Heretike and worthy to be burned. Montaigne, too, adds his protest to the same effect: The opinions of men [he says] are received, according to ancient belief, by authority and upon trust, as if it were religion and law, and thus the world cometh to be filled with lyes and fopperies. It is not enquired whether Galen has said anything to the purpose, but whether he has said so and so; and 'tis irreligion to question any of Aristotle's decrees. The old Frenchman adds quaintly :— Whoever should bundle up a lusty faggot of the fooleries of human wisdom would produce wonders. Nor has the growth of their higher knowledge been a very gradual one. It has come by leaps and bounds within the last two centuries, after remaining stationary for more than sixteen hundred years. The nineteenth century especially has been a period of activity and progress in the various branches of science such as the world has never seen before. Nor could it have been seen before. The full light of liberty -liberty of action and liberty of So long as it was considered impious thought was necessary for any great to pry into the mysteries that surround forward movement, and the world was us, or to risk making any discovery lying in the bonds of darkness and that might prove to be at variance with superstition. The tree of liberty is a some pre-existing belief, what progress plant of slow growth, that has fought was possible in any direction? The its upward way painfully, bowing its difficulties under which medical science head often beneath the blasts of perse- labored may be estimated from the fact cution, and often broken beneath the that dissection was forbidden by the foot of the oppressor. Like Igdrasil, clergy of the Middle Ages, on the the Tree of Life, it has its roots deep ground that it was impious to mutilate below in the Kingdom of the Dead. a form made in the image of God. We It was not till this century that it had do not find this pious objection interattained such growth as to burst into fering with such mutilation when the blossom which is everywhere bring- effected by means of the rack and the ing forth noble fruit for the service of wheel and such other clerical rather man. Had Hahnemann and Stephen- than medical instruments. But in the son, Herschel and Edison lived in the reign of Philip the Second of Spain a Middle Ages their genius would have famous Spanish doctor was actually availed mankind nothing. The slow condemned by the Inquisition to be world was not ready for them, and it burnt for having performed a surgical would have crushed and silenced them operation, and it was only by royal as it did Galileo and many another favor that he was permitted instead to brave spirit that was born out of time. expiate his crime by a pilgrimage to They would have gone under, and the Holy Land, where he died in povshouts and hymns would have cele-erty and exile. If you This being the attitude of the all- and the left upon the left. powerful Church towards medical progress, it is not surprising that medical science should have stagnated, and that Galen and Dioscorides were permitted to lay down the law in the sixteenth century as they had done since the beginning of the Christian era. Some light is thrown upon the state of things herefrom resulting by a work translated from the German in the year 1561, and entitled "A most excellent and perfecte homish apothecarye or physicke booke, for all the grefes and diseases of the bodye." would have a man become bold or impudent let him carry about him the skin or eyes of a Lion or a Cock, and he will be terrible unto them. If you would have him fearless of his enemies, nay, he will be very talkative, give him tongues, and seek out those of water frogs and ducks and such The first chapter is "Concerning the Head and his partes." Galen sayth, the head is divided into foure partes in the fore part hath blood the dominion; Colera in the ryght syde, Melancholy in the left syde, and Flegma beareth rule in the hindermost part. If the head doth ake so sore by reason of a runninge that he cannot snoffe hys nose, bath hys fete in a depe tub untill the knees and give him this medicine. . . which riseth into hys head and dryeth hys moyst braynes. Galen sayth He that hath payne in the hindermost part of hys head, the same must be let blood under the chynne, specially on the right side; also were it good ofte to burne the heyre of a man before hys nose. The braynes are greved many wayes; many there are whom the head whyrleth so sore that he thinketh the earth turneth upsyde doune Cummin refraineth the whyrling, comforteth the braynes and maketh them to growe agayne: or he may take the braynes of a hogge, rost the same upon a grede yron and cut slices thereof and lay to the greved parts. This doctrine of like helping like was of universal application, and in medical works of the Middle Ages we meet constantly with such prescriptions as these : Take the right eye of a Frogg, lap it in a peece of russet cloth and hang it about the neck; it cureth the right eye if it bee enflamed or bleared. And if the left eye be greved, do the like by the left eye of the said Frogg. Again: The skin of a Raven's heel is good against the gout, but the right heel skin must be laid upon the right foot if that be gouty, creatures notorious for their continuall noise making. On the same principle we find it prescribed as a cure for the quartane ague to lay the fourth book of Homer's Iliad under the patient's head; a remedy which had at least the negative merit of not being nauseous. Our homish apothecarye tells us that if a man be greved wyth the fallinge sicknesse, let him take a he-Wolves harte and make it to pouder and use it but if it be a woman, let her take a she Wolves harte. For those who are very weak and feeble, Hartes fete, Does fete, Bulles fete, or any mation. Somtyme is the cause of the palsye that the two stringes comminge doune from the brayne through the backbone into the fete through the one goeth the naturall hete, and through the other the colde-that the same stringes I saye, are stopped, either the one or both. The author proceeds to give directions for providing a vapor bath in this singular case, and adds that "such a bath is good for them that will not gladlye wet their fete," of whom, doubtless, there were many not only in his day but in succeeding centuries, otherwise there would have been no point in Ida Pfeiffer's famous retort, anent the prejudice entertained against eating foxes. The following advice falls with comic effect on our ears, but is given with quaintly delightful gravity: If a man have a sounding or a piping in hys eares, let him put oyle of Hempsede warm into hys eares, and after that let him leape upon his one legge, upon that side where the disease is; then let him bowe doune hys eare of that syde, if haply any moysture would issue out. if a mannis nose bleede, beat egges shales to pouder and sift them through a linnen cloth and blew them into hys nose: if the shales were of egges whereout yonge chickens are hatched it were so much the better. For sore throat a "drinke of Lycoris" is prescribed, and the patient is enjoined to "hold it a little in the mouth and wambel it roundabout." For weak eyes the patient is to "take the tounge of a foxe, and hange the same about his necke, and so long it hangeth there his sight shall not wax feeble, as sayth Pliny." The hanging of such amulets round the neck was very frequently prescribed, and the efficacy of them is a thing curiously well attested. Elias Ashmole in his diary for 1681 has entered the following: I tooke this morning a good dose of elixir, and hung three spiders about my neck, and they drove my ague away. Deo gratias! A baked toad hung in a silk bag about the neck was also held in high esteem, as was a toad, either alive or dried, laid upon the back of the neck as a means of stopping a bleeding at the nose; and again, either frogg or toade, the nails whereof have been clipped, hanged about one that is sick of quartane ague, riddeth away the disease for ever, as sayth Pliny. We have even a striking instance of the benefit derived from an amulet by a horse, who could not be suspected of having helped forward the cure by the strength of his faith in it. The root of cut Malowe hanged about the neck driveth away blemishes of the eyen, whether it be in a man or a horse, as, Jerome of Brunsweig, have seene myselfe. I have myselfe done it to a blind horse that I bought for X crounes, and was sold of XL crounes agayn a trick distinctly worth knowing. A good pouder for the jaundis is as followes: take earthwormes and cut them small, and braye them wyth a litle wyne so that he may swalow it drincke the same fasting. Dronkennesse [he says-and it might be written in letters of gold] doth weaken the wytt and the memorie so sore that a ... man knoweth no more what he doth than an unreasonable beast. . . . If a man be in a hot place, and much noyse, to which he is not accostumed, the drynck doth swetely overcomme hym; but he that knoweth he is greved wyth that impediment, the same ought so muche the more to take heede, for it maketh feeble every mannis body and soule, hys understandynge, witte, and honestie. In a chapter headed thus, "To knowe whether a man be possessed wyth an evill spirit," it is advised to take the harte and liver of a fysshe called a Pyck, and put them into a pott wyth glowynge hot coles, and hold the same to the patient so that the smoke may entre into hym. If he is possessed he cannot abyde that smoke, but rageth and is angry. It is to be feared that possession by evil spirits would prove to be sadly common if this test were widely applied. It is good also to make a fyre in hys chamber of Juniper wood, and caste into the fire Frankincense and S. John's wort, for the evill spirits cannot abyde thys sent, and waxe angry, wherby may be perceived whether a man be possessed or not. The author goes on to describe many He that is become madde with sadness, ought to be fayre spoken, and manye things should be promised him, and some be given. If it cometh of Flegma, then are hys braynes corrupt, and to suche an one doth the devill gladly accompany: hys beste meates were old hennes or ccokes well sodden. If a man becommeth madde of colde, it were good forthwyth to take a black henne, quicke, and open her upon the backe and laye the same warme to hys head, for the same doth warm his heade and braynes very well. also the The distinct kinds of madness proceeding | many of the remedies prescribed is asfrom various sources, and the best tonishing in its ingenuity, even for an methods of dealing with them: age when humanity to animals was not so much as dreamt of. The efficacy of the remedy seemed, indeed, to depend largely upon the amount of suffering it entailed on the animal whose medicinal virtue was called into operation. heart of a snake, of a seagull, or an owl, was constantly prescribed, but was to be torn from the living animal. So too were the eyes and tongues of many animals, as "prettie litle snout" of a mouse; but it was specially added that the creature thus mutilated was not to be put out of its misery, but was afterwards to be set free. Frogs and toads in particular were singled out for barbarous treatment, and were deemed sovereign remedies for many ailments if impaled or flayed or ripped open. Hares and other animals bein oil or wine; and even honey was came of much esteem when drowned said to be of higher efficacy if it were honey in which many bees had been If a mannes wittes were spred abroad, and thou wilt gather agayn the scattered wittes, then take a greate brasse basin and set it sidelings to the wall so that it do leane wholly upon the wall, and take a laver wyth a cock, full of water; set that hygh upon a cupborde, and open the cock a litle, so that the water drop by litle and litle upon the basin, and make a ringinge, and run out of the basin agayne. Into this chamber lay the patient so that he cannot see this; then doth he muse so muche upon that droppinge and ringinge, what it may be, that at the last he fastneth his wittes and gathereth them agayne. killed. Men's hearts being thus wholly hardened to the sufferings of dumb aniThese were all strikingly mild and mals, it is no great matter for surprise gentle measures towards mad people, if their treatment of their fellow-men in an age when the most famous physi- was not marked by any great tendercians prescribed for treatment the cast-ness or gentleness. Their remedies ing of them into the sea, or immersing were often of a highly heroic character. them in water until nearly drowned. We find the memory of this practice in France perpetuated in the name given to part of the shore at Biarritz which is known as the Côte des Fous, by reason that formerly mad people were brought there and held down while the Atlantic rollers broke over them. In Cornwall it was the soothing practice to seat the patient on the brink of a certain pool, when the unsuspecting victim was, by a sudden blow on the breast, tumbled into the pool, where he was tossed up and down by certain strong persons, till, being quite debilitated, his fury forsook him. "Autres temps, autres mœurs," is a truth of blissful significance to all those who are afflicted in mind or body. The mixture of childish superstition and inhuman cruelty which dictated In one case it is advised to "take a paving-stone and hold it upon the sore place," adding that, "though this does not wholly ayde, yet doth it not hurt." One would have thought that such very qualified commendation might equally have been given to some less ponderous remedy than a paving-stone. When treating of asthma the author prescribes a singular remedy, which would so startle a patient of Sir Andrew Clark's that it might even be the means of effecting a miraculous cure. Another experience for him that cannot wel take breth, which I have often shewed poore people, namely, to pull the patient sore by the earlap upwardly, and incontinently he shall be healed. Again, in cases of fainting, the gentle doctor says : If the harte be faint by reason of the superfluous emptynesse of the body, then let his face be cooled with water, pul him by the nose, and scratch him about the pit of the stomach. Enough has, I think, been said to prove that our forefathers must have suffered much of physicians, and we can only suppose that they had recourse to them as rarely as was possible. Agrippa, writing in 1530, said with pleasant irony that Physic was "a certaine Arte of manslaughter," and that "well neare alwaies there is more daunger in the Physition and the Medicine than in the sicknesse itselfe." He gives us a lively picture of a fashionable doctor of those times : ... who look with distrust and fear on the From Blackwood's Magazine. EVENINGS WITH MADAME MOHL. were in ON turning over the leaves of an old clad in brave apparaile, having ringes on his note-book which has been unopened fingers glimmeringe with pretious stoanes, and which hath gotten fame and credence for years, we come upon the name of for having been in farre countries, or for Madame Mohl. To her we having an obstinate manner of vaunting debted for great kindness, and the with stiffe lies that he hath great remedies, mere mention of her name presents and for having continually in his mouth vividly to one's mind that remarkable many wordes halfe Greeke and barbarous. personality that quaint, gifted little But this will prove to be true, that woman, who so many years presided Physitians moste commonlye be naught. over the brilliant gatherings at 120 Rue They have one common honor with the du Bac. Although our recollections of hangman, that is to saye, to kill menne one who filled so prominent a position and to be recompensed therefore. in Paris society are very fragmentary, Montaigne had an hereditary and they may not be unacceptable to those very intelligible detestation of doctors, who never enjoyed the privilege of her and is said to have been "very obsti- friendship. And to her friends -- and nate in his hatred and contempt of they were many-perhaps we may be their prescriptions; nor can we feel able to recall some trait of our warmsurprise. Many of them were of a hearted country woman, who was SO nature too disgusting to allude to; yet highly original, so full of kindness, and because they bore the Hall mark of who exercised a magnetic attraction authority and dated from classic times for all who came in contact with her. it would have been heresy and ruin for a doctor avowedly to contemn them, whatever his own private convictions may have been. The name also revives the memory of M. Jules Mohl, "the husband of Madame Mohl," as one who was on brotherly terms sometimes jokingly adWho is there now living who cannot dressed him, and who can never be sympathize with the more intellectual forgotten by those who had the honor minority of those days in their long, of calling him friend. Sainte-Beuve's unequal struggle to shake off the gall- description of him was so true: "A ing, crushing yoke of authority and man who was the very embodiment of tradition under which all departments learning and of inquiry; the Oriental of knowledge groaned? Or who is savant-more than a savant, a sagethere now living who can honestly with a mind clear, loyal, and vast; a wish that his lot on earth had been cast German mind passed through an Enin those good old days, as they are glish filter a cloudless, unruffled mirfondly, if ignorantly, called? Those ror, open and limpid; of pure and |