Curiosities of Medical Experience Part 12

According to our laws intoxication is looked upon as an aggravation of any offence. Sir Edward c.o.ke calls a drunkard _voluntarius daemon_. The Romans thought differently: with them intoxication was often deemed an extenuation of guilt, "Per vinum delapsis capitalis poena remitt.i.tur."

The Greeks, more severe, had a law of Pittacus that enacted the infliction of a double punishment on those who committed a crime when drunk.

That hard drinking was introduced from Flanders and Holland, and other northern countries, seems probable from the derivation of many of the expressions used in carousing. The phrase of being "half-seas over," as applied to a state of drunkenness, originated from _op zee_, which in Dutch meant _over sea_; and Gifford informs us that it was a name given to a stupifying beer introduced in England from the Low Countries, and called _op zea_; thus Jonson in the Alchemist:

I do not like the dulness of your eye; It hath a heavy cast, 'tis _up see Dutch_.

An inebriating draught was also called an _up see freeze_, from the strong _Friesland_ beer. The word "carouse," according to Gifford and Blount, is derived from the name of a large gla.s.s, called by the Danes _ruuse_, or from the German words _gar_, _all_, and _ausz out_: hence drink _all out_.

Nash, in the work above quoted, says, "Now he is n.o.body that cannot drink _super nagulum_, carouse the hunters' _hoope_, quaff _upsee freze crosse_, with healths, gloves, mumpes, frolickes, and a thousand such domineering inventions." The origin of these slang terms is not quite evident.

Drinking _super nagulum_, or on the nail, was a northern custom which consisted in only leaving one drop in the cup, which was poured upon the thumb-nail, to prove that justice had been done to the potation or toast; and that, to use the language of modern drinkers, the gla.s.s was _cleared_.

This custom is alluded to by Bishop Hall in his "Mundus alter et idem," in which the Duke of Tenderbelly exclaims, "'Let never this goodly-formed goblet of wine go jovially through me:' and then he set it to his mouth, stole it off every drop, save a little remainder, which he was by custom to set upon his thumb's nail and lick it off." In Fletcher we find the phrase

I am thine _ad unguem_;

which meant he was ready to drink with him to this extent. The term _hoop_ alludes to the marks of hoops being traced upon drinking-pots to point out certain measures. Jack Cade says, "The three-hooped pot shall have ten hoops, and I will make it felony to drink small beer!" Hence probably the common saying of "drinking deep," or to the last hoop. The _peg tankard_ was another measured vessel used in the jollifications of our forefathers, and is still to be found in some parts of England, more especially in Derbys.h.i.+re. Pegge in his "Anonymiana," thus describes them: "They have in the inside a row of eight pins, one above the other, from top to bottom; the tankard holds two quarts, so that there is a gill of ale between each peg or pin. The first person who drank was to empty to the first peg, the second was to drink to the next, and so on; by which means the pegs were so many measures to the compotators, making them all drink alike or the same quant.i.ty." In Archbishop Anselm's Canons made in the council at London in 1102, priests are enjoined not to go to drinking-bouts, nor to _drink pegs_: "Ut presbyteri non eant ad potationes, nec ad _pinnas_ bibant."

_Gloves_, also called _shoeing-horns_, were relishes to encourage drinking, like our modern _devils_, introduced for a similar purpose.

Bishop Hall says in his description of a carousal, "Then comes me up a service of _shoeing-horns_ of all sorts,--salt cakes, red-herrings, anchovies, and gammon of bacon, and abundance of such _pullers on_."

Ma.s.singer thus describes these incentives:

I usher Such an unexpected dainty bit for breakfast As never yet I cooked; 'tis not _botargo_, Fried frogs, potatoes marrow'd, cavear, Carps' tongues, the pith of an English chine of beef, Nor our Italian delicate oil'd mushrooms, And yet a _drawer on too_; and if you show not An appet.i.te, and a strong one, I'll not say To eat it, but devour it, without grace too, (For it will not stay a preface,) I am shamed, And all my past provocatives will be jeer'd at.

The _botargo_ was a relish made of mullet's roes, and highly seasoned, much in use among the Italians.

Amongst many other curious frolics of hard drinkers, we find the use of what they called _flap-dragons_, or _snap-dragon_, which consisted in igniting combustible substances, which were swallowed while floating on the gla.s.s of liquor. Johnson describes them "a play in which they catch raisins out of burning brandy, and, extinguis.h.i.+ng them by closing the mouth, eat them." This prank is not uncommon to the present day in boarding-schools in certain festive entertainments of the _young ladies_.

Drunkenness being considered a beastly propensity, its gradations were fixed by animal comparisons. In a curious treatise on drunkards by George Gascoigne, we find the following ill.u.s.tration of these degrees: "The first is _ape-drunk_, and he leaps and sings and hallos and danceth for the hearers; the second is _lion-drunk_, and he flings the pots about the house, calls the hostess w----, breaks the gla.s.s windows with his dagger, and is apt to quarrel with any man that speaks to him; the third is _swine-drunk_, heavy, lumpish, and sleepy, and cries for a little more drink and a few more clothes; the fourth is _sheep-drunk_, wise in his own conceit, when he cannot bring forth a right word; the fifth is _maudlin-drunk_, when a fellow will weep for kindness in the midst of his drink, and kiss you, saying, 'By G--! Captain, I love thee! Go thy ways; thou dost not think so often of me as I do of you; I would I could not love thee so well as I do!' and then he puts his finger in his eye and cries; the sixth is _martin-drunk_, when a man is drunk, and drinks himself sober ere he stir; the seventh is _goat-drunk_, when in drunkenness he hath no mind but in lechery; the eighth is _fox-drunk_, when he is crafty drunk, as many of the Dutchmen be, which will never bargain but when they are drunk. All these species, and more, I have seen practised _in one company at one sitting_."

Drunkenness has at various periods been resorted to in religious and political fervour. Daring the usurpation of Cromwell, the Cavaliers were wont to drink their king's health in b.u.mpers of wine in which some crumbs of bread had been thrown, exclaiming, "G.o.d send this _crum-well_ down!"

and Whitelocke, in his Memorials, records the following barbarous Catilinian orgies: "Five drunkards agree to drink the king's health in their blood, and that each of them should cut out a piece of his b.u.t.tock, and fry it upon the gridiron, which was done by four of them, of whom one did bleed so exceedingly that they were fain to send for a chirurgeon, and so were discovered. The wife of one of them, hearing that her husband was amongst them, came to the room, and, taking up a pair of tongs, laid about her, and so saved the cutting of her husband's flesh."

The laws enacted to prevent drunkenness at various periods and by different governments, are curious. Domitian ordered all the vine-plants in the Roman territory to be rooted out. Charles IX. of France issued a similar edict. In 1536, under Francis I, a law was pa.s.sed sentencing drunkards to imprisonment on bread and water for the first offence; a public whipping punished a second infringement; and, on reiteration, banishment and the loss of ears. The ancients, equally aware of the danger that arose from intoxication, were also anxious to prevent it. Draco inflicted capital punishments. Lycurgus destroyed the vineyards. The Athenians had officers, named _ophthalmos_, to prevent excesses in liquor drinking. In Rome, patricians were not allowed the use of wine until they had attained their thirty-fifth year. Wine was only drunk pure in the beginning of sober repasts in honour of _Deus Sospes_, and afterwards mixed with water in honour of _Jupiter Servator_. Notwithstanding these wise examples in support of prudent precepts, it appears that drunkenness was a common vice amongst the Romans. Tiberius was surnamed _Biberius_; and it was said of the parasite Bibulus, "dum vixit, aut bibit aut minxit." Aurelia.n.u.s had officers of his household whose duty was to intoxicate foreign amba.s.sadors; and Cato's partiality for the juice of the grape has been recorded by Horace,

Narratur et prisci Catonis Saepe mero caluisse virtus.

In the middle ages, drinking was resorted to by the monks as a religious libation; and they also drank to the dead, a custom which was condemned as idolatrous. These excesses were restrained by various regulations, and in 817 the quant.i.ty of wine allowed each monk was fixed at five pints.

Charlemagne, in his Capitularies, forbids the provocation of drinking healths and hob-n.o.bbing (_pleger et trinquer_). Temperance societies are not modern inst.i.tutions. In 1517, Sigismund de Dietrichstein established one under the auspices of St. Christopher; a similar a.s.sociation was formed in 1600 by Maurice Duke of Hesse, which, however, allowed a knight to drink seven _bocaux_, or gla.s.ses, at each meal, but only twice in the day. The size of these _bocaux_ is not recorded, but no doubt it was an endeavour to obtain a comparative condition of sobriety. Another temperate society, under the name of the Golden Ring, was inst.i.tuted by Frederic V.

Count Palatine.

Whether the influence of temperate societies or their advocates will tend to diminish the consumption of wine and spirituous liquors in the British empire, it is difficult to say. Hitherto every act of interference, either from individuals or on the part of the legislature, has proved not only abortive, but has increased the evil it was intended to remedy. The imposition of heavy duties only threw the distillation of spirits into the hands of illicit speculators instead of respectable capitalists; and, as M'Culloch justly remarks, "superadded the atrocities of the smuggler to the idleness and dissipation of the drunkard." During the latter part of the reign of George I. and the earlier period of George II. gin-drinking was so prevalent, that it was denounced from the pulpit and the press. At length ministers determined to make a vigorous effort to put a stop to the further use of spirituous liquors except as a cordial or medicine. To accomplish this end, a duty of twenty s.h.i.+llings was laid on spirits, exclusive of a heavy licence duty to retailers, while a fine of 100_l._ was levied on all defaulters. But instead of the antic.i.p.ated effects, this act produced results directly opposite: the respectable dealers withdrew from a trade proscribed by the legislature; and the sale of spirits fell into the hands of the lowest and most profligate characters.

The officers of the revenue were hunted down by the populace, and did not dare to enforce the law; and Tindal, in his Continuation of Rapin, says, "within two years of the pa.s.sing of this act, it had become so odious and contemptible, that policy as well as humanity forced the commissioners of excise to mitigate its penalties." During these two years twelve thousand persons were convicted of offences connected with the sale of spirits, while no exertion could check the torrent of smuggling, and seven millions of gallons illicitly distilled were annually consumed in London and its environs. Our present consumption of British, Colonial and Foreign spirits is immense, but not equal to what it was at the period alluded to. The following is the account of this consumption in 1832:

In England, 1,530,988 imperial gallons, Foreign.

3,377,507 " Colonial.

7,259,287 " British.

In Scotland, 69,236 gallons, Foreign.

112,026 " Colonial.

5,407,097 " British.

In Ireland, 33,413 " Foreign.

24,432 " Colonial.

8,657,756 " British.

In that year, 1832, the total amount of spirits that paid duty in the United Kingdom was 2,646,258 gallons, yielding a revenue of 8,483,247_l._ In the same year the appearance and dread of the cholera produced a singular increase in the consumption of brandy. In the preceding year, 1831, the entries for home use in England had amounted to 1,194,717 gallons; but during this state of alarm, it increased to 1,508,924; in 1833, the danger having subsided, the consumption declined to its former level, and did not exceed 1,356,620 gallons.

From the above observations it may be inferred, that no penal enactments, no denunciations of canting senators or fanatic preachers, will ever succeed in checking the evils which must arise from excesses in the use of spirituous liquors. Gluttony and drunkenness can only be combated by the salutary effects of good example held out by the superior cla.s.ses of society; by a gradual improvement in the moral education of the lower grades, for whom salutary amus.e.m.e.nts should be procured when a cheerful repose from their weekly labour will no longer be considered a breach of the sabbath. Diffusion of knowledge and habits of industry will do more than sanctimonious admonitions, and the Penny Magazines may be considered more hostile to gin-drinking than the ranting of pseudo-saints.

In regard to the quant.i.ty that we should eat, no rules can be established, as individuals differ widely from each other, both as to their capacity and their inclination. Mr. Abernethy maintained, that it would be well if the public would follow the advice of Mr. Addison, given in the Spectator, of reading the writings of L. Cornaro, who, having a weak const.i.tution, which he seemed to have ruined by intemperance, so that he was expected to die at the age of 32, did at that period adopt a strict regimen, allowing himself only 12 ounces daily. To this remark Dr. Paris very properly observes, "When I see the habits of Cornaro so incessantly introduced as an example for imitation, and as the standard of dietetic perfection, I am really inclined to ask with Feggio, 'Did G.o.d create Lewis Cornaro to be a rule for all mankind in what they were to eat and drink?'"

In regard to the dyspeptic, Dr. Philips has given the very best advice in the following paragraph:

"The dyspeptic should carefully attend to the first feeling of satiety.

There is a moment when the relish given by the appet.i.te ceases; a single mouthful taken after this oppresses a weak stomach. If he eats slowly and carefully attends to this feeling, he will never overload the stomach." To this Dr. Paris adds, "Let him remember to _eat slowly_." "This is an important condition--for when we eat too fast we introduce a greater quant.i.ty of food into the stomach than the gastric juice can at once combat with; the consequence of which is, that hunger may continue for some time after the stomach has received more than would be sufficient, under the circ.u.mstances, to induce satiety."

The introduction of French cookery in every part of England amongst the wealthy will render attention to dietetic rules still more important than in former days; although Dean Swift, in his time, observed, "That modern epicurism had become so prevalent, that the world must be encompa.s.sed, before a washerwoman can sit down to breakfast."

INFLUENCE OF IMAGINATION.

Innumerable are the diseases that arise from our busy fancy. We are all subject to the tyrannic sway of imagination's empire. Under this mighty influence man displays energies which lead him boldly to dare danger and complicated sufferings, or he is reduced to the most degraded state of miserable despondency. These diseases are the more fearful, since they rarely yield to physical aid, and it is seldom that moral influence is sufficiently persuasive to combat their inveteracy. It is idle to tell the timid hypochondriac that he is not ill; the mere circ.u.mstance of his believing himself sick, const.i.tutes a serious disorder. His constant apprehensions derange his functions until an organic affection arises. The patient who fancies that he labours under an affection of the heart disturbs the circulation, which is ever influenced by our moral emotions, till at last this disturbance occasions the very malady which he dreaded.

These aberrations of the mind arise from various causes,--mental emotions, const.i.tution, climate, diet, hereditary disposition, education. Tertullian called philosophy and medicine twin sisters; both may become powerful agents in controlling our imagination.

The ancients have variously endeavoured to determine the seat of this faculty. Aristotle placed it in the heart, which, from the sense of its oppression observed in acute moral sufferings he considered the origin of our nerves, or sensorium. Avicenus and other philosophers located imagination in the anterior portion of the brain, which he called the _prow_; memory in the posterior part, which he denominated the _p.o.o.p_, and judgment in the centre of the organ, or what mariners would term _mid-s.h.i.+p_. The notions of Gall and Spurzheim had long since been antic.i.p.ated by philosophers and physicians, both in regard to the division of the cerebral organ, and the external appearance of the cranium, which denoted their preponderancy. That temperature exercises a powerful influence over our mental faculties is evident. In warm climates we find a greater exaltation of the mind, more enthusiasm and vivid emotion, than in northern lat.i.tudes. The East is the land of fancy, ill.u.s.trated by their wondrous tales of fiction, and their vivid and fantastic imagery, displayed in the chimeras and the arabesques of their palaces and temples.

In these regions all the pa.s.sions are uncontrollable and wild. Love is characterized by furious or dark jealousy, according to the rank and power of the lover; and ambition is signalized by bloodthirsty and promiscuous barbarity. No opposition can be brooked: man is either a ferocious tyrant, or an abject slave; subjection alone preventing the oppressed from being as sanguinary as the oppressor. Government is despotism, and religion fatality and fanaticism. In northern climes, on the contrary, every thing is cold and calculating. The almighty pa.s.sion of love may prevail; but its demonstrations are morose, concentrated, although not less ferocious than under a southern sky. In the one country, man seeks the dark shelter of the forest, and the solitude of the mountain, to ponder over his grievances, or soliloquise on his sufferings; in the other he courts the roseate bower and the orange grove, to lull him into a soft repose which may calm his feelings by temporary oblivion, to be roused again to action by the stimulus of opium, tobacco, and a burning sun. The ancients were so fully convinced of this influence of the amorphous const.i.tution, that Lucia.n.u.s tells us that the Abderites (a people so remarkable for their stupidity and sluggishness that _Abderitica mens_ was proverbial), having witnessed the performance of one of Euripides's plays under the fierce solar rays, became fired with such enthusiasm, that they ran about the streets in a wild phrensy, repeating aloud his sublime verses, until the coolness of the evening restored them to reason and to their native torpor. So predominant are these feelings, which owe their character to climate, that they regulate our ideas of a future state, as well as our conduct on earth. The paradise of the Mohammedan is a blessed region of everlasting pleasure and sensual enjoyments; beauteous houris await the soul, which is to luxuriate in corporeal voluptuousness; and the purple wine, forbidden to the living, is to flow in delectable streams, to delight the dead, who may, in the seventh paradise inhabit a land where rivers of wine, and milk, and honey, are ever flowing; where evergreen trees bend under luxurious fruits, whose very pips are transformed into lovely maidens, so sweet--to use their own metaphorical language--that the ocean would lose its bitterness if they did but condescend to spit in its briny waters; and all these enjoyments are secured to the true believer by hosts of guardian angels, who have seventy thousand mouths, and seventy thousand tongues, to praise G.o.d seventy thousand times each day in seventy thousand languages: and such is their horror of earthly heat, that in the other world one of the greatest rewards is the delight of being able to sleep under the cool shade of a tree each leaf of which is of such an expanse that a man might travel fifty thousand years under its benign protection. How different is the paradise of Odin! There, it is true, the soul of the departed dwells in magnificent palaces; but what are his enjoyments compared to those of the sensual Asiatic! Instead of soft music, the din of war is constantly to resound in his ear, while he luxuriates in drinking strong beer and hydromel, poured by the fair Valknas, the houris of the Vahalla paradise, into the skulls of his enemies. Their G.o.d is called the G.o.d of crows; and two of these sable familiars, _Hugin_, who represents the mind, and _Nunnin_, or memory, are constantly perched upon his shoulders, until they take flight to seek information for their master.

To this day it is said that the Tartars fancy, that, in their future abode of bliss, their reward will be a sort of Platonic affection, and a perpetual and undisturbed state of meditation; in short, a celestial _far niente_. So convinced were the ancients of this effect of peculiar temperature, that the morose Herac.l.i.tus maintained that the power of the mind arose from a _dry splendour_; that all things were created by solar heat; and when ill himself, he sought health by endeavouring to dispel watery acc.u.mulations by the heat of a dunghill. Ptolemy and Posidonius a.s.sert, that southern climes engender genius and wit, and are better calculated for the study of things divine; and Plato, Hippocrates, and Galen, on the same principle, affirm that stupidity and forgetfulness are produced by cold and humidity. The celebrated Descartes, in his younger days, states that he felt his enthusiasm moderated by the damps and cold of Holland; and that he ever experienced more facility in pursuing his philosophic studies in winter than in summer. Poets, on the contrary, court the glowing rays of an inspiring sun, and their Phoebus and their Apollo is the conductor and the inspirer of the Muses:

Cynthius aurem vellit et admonuit.

That the energies of our intellectual faculties are under the influence of our food, is a fact long since observed. The stupidity of the athletae, who lived upon coa.r.s.e bread (coliphium) and underdone meat, was proverbial; even Hercules laboured under the imputation of a mind somewhat obtuse. Our genius, our energies are all affected by our mode of living. The rule of _Sanis omnia sana_, of Celsus, is applicable to very few individuals; and all our faculties may be rendered more keen or less vivid by temperance or excesses. As the nature of our _ingesta_ influences the functions of our digestive organs, so do these organs in their turn influence our moral powers when our physical energies are elevated or depressed. Our courage, our strength of mind, our religious and our moral train of thinking, are under the control of diet. Fasting has ever been considered as predisposing to meditation and ascetic contemplation. Tertullian tells us, that we should approach the altars fasting, or having eaten nothing but dry substances. All the religious ceremonies of the Egyptians were preceded by abstinence, and their sacrificators were allowed neither animal food nor wine. Indeed, the Egyptian priesthood were remarkable for their abstinence and self-denial, fearful, according to Plutarch, that "the body should not sit light upon the soul." Similar precautions were observed with animals, and the ox apis was not allowed to drink the waters of the Nile, as they were considered of a gross and fattening nature; even upon festive days they observed a similar moderation. It was customary, on the 9th day of the month Thoth, for every one to eat fried fish at their doors--the priests only conformed to the custom by burning theirs at the appointed time. In general they abstained from most sorts of pulse, especially beans and lentils, onions, garlic, leeks, mutton, pork; and on certain days of purification, even salt was forbidden. Many of their fasts lasted from seven to forty-two days, during which time they abstained entirely from animal food, from herbs and vegetables, and the indulgence of any pa.s.sion. Similar privations were observed by all those who attended the mysteries of Juno and Ceres. In Holy Writ we find that it was after abstinence that Divine inspiration illumined the elect. The angel appeared unto Daniel after he had been three weeks without tasting flesh, or wine, or "pleasant bread." In the Acts, x., we find that the vision appeared to Peter, "when he had become hungry and would have eaten." Moses fasted forty days on Mount Sinai. We find in Jonah, that even cattle were frequently subject to this mortification, when he proclaimed in Nineveh that neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, should taste any thing; "let them not feed nor drink water." Congius Ripensis tells us, that the same restriction was imposed by the Lacedaemonians on their Helots and all domestic animals. Fasting was considered by the early Christians as an essential rite. St. Anthony prescribed to his disciples one meal of dry bread, salt and water, in the day without any food on Wednesdays and Fridays. In the monastery of Mocham, in Egypt, a monk of the name of Jonas was beatified for having lived until the age of eighty-five, working hard in the garden, and without any other food than raw herbs and gra.s.s steeped in vinegar; this abstemious cen.o.bite added to his claims to canonization by always sleeping in his chair. St. Hilarius only ate fifteen figs and six ounces of barley bread _per diem_. St. Julian Sabus retired to a cavern, where he only luxuriated once in the week on millet-bread, with salt and water; and St. Macarius resolved to outdo him by restraining his sustenance to a few cabbage-leaves every Sunday. Not only did these gastric martyrs attribute their holy visions to abstinence, but they considered it as the source of their longevity. Thus, St. Anthony lived to the age of one hundred and five; St. Paphinus to ninety on dry bread; and St. Paul the Hermit thrived for one hundred and fifty-nine years upon dates. It is not derogatory to their supposed divine mission to say that all these men were as enthusiastic as the fakirs of the east.

So acceptable to the Deity was starvation considered, that at various periods it was enforced by penal laws. Charlemagne denounces the punishment of death on all those who transgressed in this respect; and, by an old Polish edict, any sinner who ate on a fast-day was sentenced to have all his teeth drawn. However, monkish ingenuity endeavoured to elude these severe enactments, by interpreting the letter instead of the spirit; and we find, in the regulations of a German monastery, the following accommodation, "_Liquidum non frangit jejunium_," by which, on days of penance, the monks only took rich soups and succulent broth. In latter days, being permitted to eat fish in Lent, they saw no reason why fowl should not be included, on the authority of Genesis, that the waters brought forth every winged fowl after his kind. This relaxation in culinary discipline called forth loud indignation from many prelates. St.

Ambrosius attributes the profligacy of the monks to these excesses; and Tertullian considers the fall of the Israelites as the punishment of their neglect in this respect. Our Shakspeare ill.u.s.trates this belief in the influence of fasting as preparatory to inspiration.

Last night the very G.o.ds shew'd me a vision-- I _fast_ and pray'd for their intelligence.

Not satisfied with this mystification in food, we find some austere monks endeavouring to reduce carnal appet.i.tes by other means, such as by blood-letting, _monialem minuere_; and claustral flesh was brought down by phlebotomy and purging at regular periods. To this day we find that well-behaved Turks, during the Ramasan, make it a G.o.dly point never to swallow their saliva.

This digression on fasting was somewhat necessary, to show how much our diet tends to modify our being. It is well known that troops will display more activity and courage when fasting than after a meal; and an ingenious physician of our day is perfectly correct when he attributes a daring spirit or a pusillanimous feeling to the influence of our stomach.

Intellectual weakness, frequently brought on by excesses, has proved a rich source to empiricism; hence the belief in mystic and supernatural agencies, and the power of certain nostrums. Coloured fountain water and bread pills have made the fortune of various quacks, when imaginary cures have relieved imaginary diseases. In our days, numerous have been the recoveries attributed to Hohenloe's prayers. Trusting to mystic numbers, three, five, seven, or nine pills have produced effects, when other numbers less fortunate would have failed. To this hour mankind, even in enlightened nations, are fettered by these absurd trammels. Credulity, and superst.i.tion her twin sister, have in all ages been the source whence priestcraft, and quackery have derived their wealth. Next to these rich mines we may rank fas.h.i.+on. The adoption of any particular medicine by princes and n.o.bles will endow it with as great a power as that which was supposed to be vested in regal hands in the cure of scrofula, hence called _king's evil_; and we have too many instances of such cures having been effected by a monarch's touch to doubt the fact. The history of the potato is a strong ill.u.s.tration of the influence of authority: for more than two centuries the use of this invaluable plant was vehemently opposed; at last, Louis XV. wore a bunch of its flowers in the midst of his courtiers, and the consumption of the root became universal in France. The warm bath, so highly valued by the Romans, once fell into disrepute, because the Emperor Augustus had been cured by a cold one, which for a time was invariably resorted to. Thus Horace exclaims,

----Caput ac stomachum supponere fontibus audent Clusinis, Gabiosque petunt et frigida rura.

Unfortunately, the means which had relieved Augustus killed his nephew Marcellus; and the _Laconic.u.m_ and the _Tepidarium_ were again crowded with the "fas.h.i.+on."