Athothis : a satire on modern medicine / by Thomas C. Minor.

week, when, noticing your advertisement in the Christian Chronicle of the Cross, I purchased three bottles of the marvelous remedy. I had hardly taken the first swallow of medicine, when I felt like another man. I went to court immediately, and my argu- ment in the case was so overpowering and eloquent, that the jurymen acquitted my client without leaving the box. After the verdict, I invited the judge to my residence, and we finished the two remaining bottles. Hereafter, your valuable specific shall never be absent from my side-board. " Respectfully, "Lex. Barrister, Attorney." " Wonderful! most wonderful!" gasped Paulus Andro- cydes, in tones of mock admiration. "Yet, I am satis- fied, and you need not read the thousands of similar indorsements, which have made Doctor Charlatan's medicines famous. Yet, methinks the ingredients of such remedies should not be kept secret, lest their tal- ented compounder might die, and the world be left desolate. Knowest thou the composition of these specifics, my Egyptian friend ? Name! oh, name! I pray thee, what is contained in these admixtures ?" " These medicines are for the most part alcohol, to which different poisons are added," answered Athothis. " Common whisky, epsom salts, and glucose are the principal remedial agents in Hippocrates' Hemorrhoid Healer." " Curious how so many people, who advocate temper- ance, enjoy their stimulants in the shape of medicine," remarked Paulus Androcydes. " Not very surprising, after all, that the columns of religious newspapers are full of fulsome notices of such panaceas. However, as you remarked, this is the age of progress, a century that boasts of its culture and intelligence. The dawn of patent theology and patent law can not be far off."