Curiosities of Olden Times Part 10

Attonitum morb.u.m nam cohibere valent.

Having laid down his principle, the doctor proceeds to apply it to various complaints, giving instances, the result of experience.

And first as to melancholy.

One predisposing cause of melancholy, observes Paullini, is love, and that eventuates in idiotcy or insanity.

To parents and guardians our author gives the advice, when the first symptoms of this complaint appear in young people under their charge, let them grasp the rod firmly, and lay it on with vigour and prompt.i.tude. The remedy is infallible. Valescus de Taranta says, in the case of a young man--and his words are words of gold--"Whip him well, and should he not mend immediately, keep him locked up in the cellar on bread and water till he promises amendment."

I saw, continues our author, an instance of the good effect of this treatment at Amsterdam. A stripling of twenty, comely enough in his appearance, the son of an artisan in the town, fell in love with the mayor's daughter. He could neither eat, drink, sleep, nor do anything in the remotest degree rational. The father, unaware of the cause, put him into the hands of a medical pract.i.tioner, who did his utmost to cure him, but signally failed. At last the father's eyes were opened by means of an intercepted letter. Like a sensible man he packed his son off to the public whipping-place, there to learn better _moralia_. And this had the desired effect; for the youth returned perfectly cured and in his right senses.

But for this treatment he might have sunk into his grave, like him mentioned by P. Boaysten, who died of a broken heart through unrequited love; and, at the post-mortem examination, his bowels were discovered to be uncoiled, his heart shrivelled, his liver shrunk to nothing, his lungs corroded, and his skull entirely emptied of every trace of brains.

For short sight there is nothing like a good thras.h.i.+ng, or at least a violent blow, says our doctor.

An old German, aged eighty, who had all his lifetime suffered from short sight, was one day jogging to market on his respectable mare, Dobbin.

Dobbin tripped on a stone and flung her rider. The old man fell upon a stone, which pierced his skull. The dense vapours which had obscured his vision for so long were enabled to escape through the aperture, and on his recovery the venerable gentleman had the sight of an eagle.

A cavalier was troubled with the same infirmity. He saw a large salmon hanging up outside a fishmonger's shop, and, mistaking it for a young lady of his acquaintance, removed his cap and addressed it with courtesy.

Another youth having made great fun of the mistake, the short-sighted cavalier felt himself constrained in honour to call him out. In the duel he received a sword wound over his left eye, and this completely cured his vision.

For deafness Dr. Paullini recommends a box on the ear. Especially successful is this treatment in the case of children who do not attend to the commands and advice of their parents on the plea of "not having heard." In such cases the employment of corporal punishment cannot be too highly estimated. The doctor tells the story of a boy destined for the ministry who ran away from school and apprenticed himself to a tailor, and who was cured of deafness and tailoring propensities by the application of a large pair of drumsticks to a sensitive part of his person, and who eventually became a Lutheran pastor, and was, to the end of his days, able to mend his own clothes.

This story furnishes the author of _Flagellum Salutis_ with matter for a digression on clerical education. He quotes with approval the sentiments of his old patron, Dr. Schupp, expressed thus: "Nowadays that every b.u.mpkin makes his son study for the ministry, we have them scrambling about the country begging for promotion, and grumbling because it does not come as fast as they expect. The learned son is a poor curate, with no benefice. Such a to-do about this--complaints, murmurs, and what not! Why did he not learn a trade in addition to his theology? Luke the Evangelist was a theologus and medicus as well, and a painter to boot. Paul in his youth studied divinity at the feet of Gamaliel, but he was a carpet manufacturer besides. Was the Kaiser Rudolph a worse Emperor for being as well a clever craftsman? 'If I could recall my past years and begin life again,' said Dr. Schupp, 'I would not become a student only, but learn a trade besides. Then, if the thankless world kicked me, I would measure its foot for a boot; if it made faces at me, I would paint its portrait for it; if my divinity did not agree with its stomach, I would dose it with purgatives like Luke. I would make the world respect me for my diligence in trade, if it turned up its nose at my theology. Anyhow, I would not go about snivelling and crying poverty and want of promotion.'"

To this speech of Dr. Schupp, Paullini adds a few pertinent remarks. "The lad I was telling you about," he says, "had a hankering after tailoring.

Well, tailoring is an honourable and useful profession. Was not Moses bidden, 'Thou shalt make holy garments for Aaron thy brother, for glory and for beauty. And thou shalt speak unto all that are wise-hearted, whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom, that they may make Aaron garments.' Tailors filled with the spirit of wisdom! Why despise the craft which G.o.d has honoured?"

It must be allowed that there is sense in this little digression.

Doubtless it would be well if not only those destined for the ministry, but all the sons of the higher cla.s.ses of society, were taught some manual employment in addition to the cultivation of their intellectual faculties.

That our grammar schools should take the hint is not to be antic.i.p.ated; masters and governors have the same implicit confidence in cla.s.sic studies as the universal panacea that Dr. Paullini professes for the rod and Dr.

Sangrado for cold water and blood-letting. I do not dispute the fact that the most useful knowledge for a lad to acquire who is destined for colonial farming, or for a mercantile life at home, is Greek prosody; but I suggest that an acquaintance with carpentering, land-surveying, or book-keeping might be found advantageous in a secondary degree.

Lockjaw is to be treated in the same manner, a.s.serts our author, and he tells an amusing anecdote on the subject from Volquard Iversen.

Nicolas Vorburg was an Oriental traveller. In the course of his wanderings he reached Agra, the capital of the Great Cham. The European was introduced to His Majesty at the dinner-hour, and found the monarch just returned from the expedition, and as hungry as a hunter. A bowl of rice was brought in. The Great Cham dipped his hands into it, and ladled so much rice as they would hold into his capacious mouth, distended to the utmost conceivable extent. But the Great Cham had overestimated the capabilities of the distension of his jaws, and they became dislocated. At the sight, the servants were distracted with fear. The n.o.bles stroked their chins in uncertainty how to act, the priests had recourse to their devotions, but no one a.s.sisted the monarch out of his dilemma. He sat upon his imperial throne purple in the face, his eyes distended with horror, his mouth gaping, and full of rice. Suffocation was imminent. Nicolas Vorburg, without even prostrating himself before the emperor, ran up the steps of his throne, and hit him a violent crack with the palm of his hand upon the cheek. The rice fell out of his mouth upon the imperial lap, some, it is surmised, descended the imperial red-lane. Another slap accomplished the relief of the monarch, and set the jaw once more in working order. At the same moment the servants screamed at the outrage committed upon the sacred majesty of the emperor, the n.o.bles drew their swords to avenge it, and the priests converted their prayers for the recovery of their king into curses on the head of him who had sacrilegiously raised his hand to violate his divinity. Poor Vorburg would have been made into mincemeat, had not the emperor providentially recovered his breath in time to administer a reproof to his over-zealous subjects. He acknowledged the relief afforded him by the stranger by a present of a thousand rupees.

A tailor had a son who was half-witted. The father was out one day, and the child, who was left in the house, after the manner of children, looked about him in quest of some mischief which he might perpetrate. A pair of elegant breeches, just completed by his father, and designed for the legs of a n.o.bleman, hung suspended from the wall. The child made a figured pattern upon the amber silk with his finger, dipped at intervals in the ink-pot. The mother was the first to discover the transformation of the breeches, and, not regarding the alteration in the same light as did her child, caught up the yard-measure and administered a castigation to the culprit, sufficient to "stir up the stagnating juices, dissolve the precipitating salts, and purify the coagulating humours," in at least one portion of the lad's body. The youth, under the impression that high art is never appreciated at first sight, made himself scarce for some hours.

The father, on his return, used every effort to obliterate the flowering of ink which his son had drawn over the amber breeches, but with only a limited degree of success--so limited, in fact, that the n.o.bleman for whom they were destined utterly refused to invest his person in them, and they were returned on the tailor's hands. The boy, towards evening, impelled by hunger, had returned home, and was soothing his injured feelings with bread and b.u.t.ter, when the father re-entered the house. In a moment the parental left hand had grasped the scruff of his neck, whilst the right hand dexterously completed the stirring up the stagnant juices, dissolving of precipitating salts, and purifying of coagulating humours with such success, that Dr. Paullini a.s.sures us the child grew up a miracle of discretion, and never after decorated articles of clothing other than his own pinafore.

Under the heading of "Swollen b.r.e.a.s.t.s," the learned doctor gives us his ideas on the subject of schoolmasters and their t.i.tles. These remarks are sensible enough in their way, but hardly come under the heading he has selected for the chapter. Connected still more vaguely with swollen b.r.e.a.s.t.s is the commentary on some verses in the twenty-first chapter of St. John's Gospel, which closes the section.

To those who suffer from toothaches he recommends the practice of a learned professor under whom he studied. This man suffered excruciating torture from his teeth at night. The professor, the moment that his sufferings began, was wont to leave his bed and spend his night in jumping on to his table, and then jumping down again, till the pain ceased.

Paullini does not state the feelings of those who slept in the room immediately underneath that occupied by Dr. Erasmus Vinding; neither does it seem clear at first sight how the jumping diversion is connected with the subject of the rod, concerning the merits of which the book treats; but on further consideration the connection becomes apparent. Dr. Paullini being silent on this point, we have but the light of nature to guide us to the conclusion that the saltatory performances of Dr. Erasmus would arouse and exasperate the other lodgers into an application of the universal panacea to his scantily protected person.

For const.i.tutional indolence the rod is inestimable; the monotony of its use as a specific may, however, be pleasingly varied by an application of corporal punishment in the following disguised form, which, if severe, is nevertheless infallible as a cure. Hermann Habermann, a native of Mikla, deserves the credit of being the first to communicate it to the medical profession. Habermann had spent many years in Iceland, and it was there that he saw the treatment in use. An artisan suffering from indolence was recommended by a native doctor to let himself be sewn up in a sack stuffed with wool, and then be dragged about, rolled down hill, thumped, kicked, and jumped upon by his friends and acquaintances. When he emerged from the sack he was to take a draught to open his pores, and to go to bed. The remedy was tried, and succeeded.

A somewhat similar cure came under Paullini's personal observation. A n.o.bleman had a jester who was dotingly fond of fowls. He stole all his master's poultry, so that his master was obliged to do without eggs for his breakfast. The fool, moreover, was deficient in fun, and was by no means worth his keep. At last his master determined on correcting him severely. He had him sewn up in a hop-bag and well thrashed, and then rolled down hill and thrashed again. The fool never stole eggs from that day forward, and from being but a poor fool he became one famous for his brilliant parts and sparkling humour.

For tertian fever, the rod is an admirable specific. A lawyer once suffered from this complaint, which left him at times able to continue his avocation. He had brought upon himself the ill-feeling of a certain gentleman whom he had, in one of his pleadings, turned into ridicule. This person determined to punish the advocate as soon as a convenient opportunity presented itself. The opportunity came. The lawyer was riding home one day, past the house of the n.o.bleman, when the latter descried him, and immediately sent him a message requesting a moment's private conversation. The unfortunate advocate fell into the trap. Expecting to get employment in a fresh suit, he hurried eagerly to the castle, only to find the gates closed upon him and all egress prevented. In another moment the insulted gentleman stood before him.

"Vile bloodhound of the law!" he exclaimed, "you have long escaped the punishment due to you for your insolence and temerity. You disgraced me publicly, and I shall revenge myself upon you by degrading you in a manner certain to humble your pride. Yet I am merciful. I give you your choice of two modes of suffering. You shall either sit on an ant-hill, in the clothing provided you by nature, till you have learned by heart the seven penitential psalms; or you shall run the gauntlet in the same _degage_ costume round my courtyard, where will be ranged all my servants armed with rods wherewith to belabour you."

The hapless lawyer cast himself on his knees before the n.o.bleman, and implored mercy. He pleaded that he had his wife and children to provide for; but the other replied that this was not to the point, as he had no intention of injuring the lady or the infants. Then the lawyer alleged his illness, saying that the access of fever would be on him next day, and that the punishment wherewith he was threatened--either of them in fact--might terminate fatally.

"That," replied the injured gentleman, "can only be ascertained by experiment. My own impression is that the ants or the whips will produce a counter irritation, which may prove beneficial. Still," he continued, stroking his chin, "we mortals are all liable to err, and my impression may be unfounded. I will frankly acknowledge my mistake if convinced by the result taking the direction you antic.i.p.ate."

Reluctantly the poor advocate made his election of the treatment he was to undergo. From the ants and the penitential psalms he recoiled with horror, and he chose shudderingly to run the gauntlet. So he ran it.

Black and blue, bruised and bleeding, the wretched man was dismissed at last, to return to the bosom of his family. The n.o.bleman was right, the lawyer was forever cured of his tertian fever.

In another work of the same author (_Zeitkurzende, erbauliche l.u.s.t_, 8vo, Frankfort, 1693) the doctor argues the case, whether an honourable man may thrash his wife; and concludes that such a course of action entirely depends on the behaviour and temperament of the wife.

Woman was created to be good, quiet, and orderly; when she is otherwise she is going contrary to her vocation, and art must be employed to correct nature. Eve was given to Adam, reasons Paullini, to be a helpmeet to him, and not to be the plague and worry of his life. Woman's vocation is to be a modest and gentle angel, and not to be a brazen, furious demon.

Every woman is either one or the other. If she is as heaven made her, she takes to the bit and rein readily, is easily managed without the whip, and is perfectly docile. If, however, she is what the evil one would have her, she takes the bit in her teeth, sets back her ears, plunges, and kicks; and woe to the man who comes within reach of her tongue, her claws, or her toes. Then there is need for the rod. To a good wife, "there is a golden ornament upon her, and her bands are purple lace: thou shalt put her on as a robe of honour, and shalt put her about thee as a crown of joy." But as for the bad wife, deal with her after the advice of the poet Joachim Rachel:--

Thou wilt be constrained her head to punch, And let not thine eye then spare her: Grasp the first weapon that comes to hand-- Horsewhip, or cudgel, or walking-stick, Or batter her well with the warming-pan; Dread not to fling her down on the earth, Nerve well thine arm, let thy heart be stout As iron, as bra.s.s, or stone, or steel.

For no wrath is equal to a woman's wrath; and better is it to live in the cage of an African lion, or of a dragon torn from its whelps, than to live in the house with such a woman. Of all wickedness the worst is woman's wickedness. Why, asks the doctor, what sort of a life did Jupiter lead in heaven with his precious Juno? Poor G.o.d! he let her get the upper hand of him. Had he but taken his stick to her instead of scolding, he might have had Olympus quiet, and have saved himself from being badgered through eternity.

They managed things better in Rome. A man had a wife full of bad tempers.

He went to the oracle and asked what should be done with a garment which had moths in it. "Dust it," was the oracular response. "And," added the man, "I have a wife who is full of her nasty little tempers; should not she be treated in a similar manner?" "To be sure," answered the oracle, "dust her daily." And never was a truer or better bit of advice given by an oracle.

The work of Dr. Paullini called forth others in response, and doubtless enthusiastic devotees of the rod abounded. His views were, however, combated by others. From a tract against the use of the rod I cull one curious and droll story, wherewith to conclude this article:--

A husband accompanied his wife to confession. The lady having opened her griefs, the father who was shriving her insisted on administering a severe penitential scourging. The husband, hearing the first stroke inflicted on his better half, interfered, and urged that his wife was delicate, and that as he and she were one flesh, it would be better for him, as the stronger vessel, to receive the scourging intended for his helpmate. The confessor having consented to this subst.i.tution, the man knelt in his wife's place, while she retired from the confessional. Whack! whack! went the cat, followed by a moan from the good man's lips.

"Harder!--harder!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the wife; "I am a grievous sinner!"

Whack! whack! whack!

"Lay it on!" cried she; "I am the worst of sinners."

Whack! whack! and a howl from the sufferer.

"Never mind his cries, father!" exclaimed she; "remember only my sins.

Make him smart here, that I may escape in purgatory."

"HERMIPPUS REDIVIVUS"

"Man," said the learned Prioli, "is composed of soul, body, and goods. In his pilgrimage through life these component parts are constantly exposed to three mortal enemies: the devils, who are ever seeking the destruction of his soul; the doctors, who are intent on ruining his const.i.tution; and the lawyers, who seek to rob him of his goods."

We will put the devils aside for a moment, the lawyers, too, with the tongs, and devote our attention to the doctors. We have already examined the medical treatise ent.i.tled _Flagellum Salutis_, wherein was exposed the excellence of the whip for the cure of every disorder to which mortality is heir. We propose considering another equally startling tractate in this paper, one more modern by a few years than that of Dr. Paullini, but its superior in absurdity. The t.i.tle of the work is "Hermippus Redivivus, or a curious physico-medical examination of the extraordinary manner in which he extended his life to 115 years by inhaling the breath of little girls; taken from a Roman memorial, but now supported on medical grounds, as also ill.u.s.trated and elucidated by a wondrous discovery of philosophical chemistry, by Johan Heinrich Cohausen, M.D." 8vo, 1743.[2] This extraordinary book is adorned with an ill.u.s.tration, representing a pedagogue with a big nose, of Brobdingnagian proportions, keeping a mixed school of solemn little girls in jackets and ap.r.o.ns, and little prigs of boys in stocks, knee-breeches, coats, and wigs. One little boy, whose body is the size of the master's hand, sits reading a book on his right knee.

On the ground at his left is a little maiden, just reaching to the top of the master's gaiters. A tiny dog is sitting up begging in the midst of a cla.s.s in the middle distance; and in the background, behind a row of urchins who are not looking at their books, is a cat as big as any one of them, attacking a cage containing a singing bird. The whole of this strange work is built on a Roman inscription, said to have been found in the seventeenth century, and figured by Thomas Reinsius in his _Syntagma Inscriptionum Antiquarum_, and afterwards by Johann Keyser in his _Parna.s.sus Clivensis_. This inscription, which is almost certainly not genuine, runs as follows:--