Wilmington journal. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1844-1895, 1853-05-20


Hath stained the earth with gore,
For castles in the air that fell
Before the strife was DER.
The Methusaleh PHI.
! Mr.. Prattles poor man He had wife and
a large family dependent on him and his printing
business brought him in only very slender income
! His neghbors often wondered how he contri1ed to
make both ends meet. They knew nothing of the
struggle that went within the walls of MIR. Pratt
ties establishment. The surrounding tradesmen
were his customers. He had shrewd notion of bu
(sness however. When the grocer over the way
gave him order to print fifty copies of Fine Con-
gou at three-and sixpence" he knew very well that
the grocer down the road would soon empower him
to print bills advertising ' Fine CongOu at three
and -fvepence three farthings;' to which would be
added the further intelligence that now was the
time !" The keener the competition in the neigh
borhood. the better for MIR. Prattles Among the
orders, MIR. Prattles one day received command to
strike off thousand labels for " Mr.. Smiths Uni
versal Pills. No sooner had he delivered the first
batch of labels, than second order was given for
FIVE thousand more labels; and the second order
Immediately succeeded by third, and third by
fourth.
This influx of business surprised Mr. Prattles :
and he began to envy the prosperity of Mr.. Smith
Presently it struck him that it was no difficult mat
ter to manufacture pill But how could he hope
to invent story so plausible as that which enyelop
here. Mr.. Smith had fortified himself in every pos
sble way. lie had selected the most obscure villa
ges of the country from the gazetteer and had writ
ten very characteristic testimonials from imaginary
patients residing these remote localities. His
pill was-these spurious documents declared-an
infallible cure for every disease. He tackled to his
pill the properties of the entire pharmacopGia. Mr.
Smiths pill was advertised to accomplish everything
of which medical science was capable. The history
of Mr.. Smiths pill narrative of blessings
ferred upon frail mortality. By the virtues of Mr.
Smiths pill, John Dobbns, of CwyrytchcmwIl, in
Wales, had been cured of bad leg, which had baf
fled the ingenuity of the first surgeons in the
try. Mr.. Smiths pill restored Miss Brown, of Brar
Cottage Battle-dore- cum Shuttlecock, to life
when the rattles in her throat. 1t cured asth
ma, consumption, water on the brain dropsy, and
influenza it infallible in scarlet fever yellow
jaundice, and blue cholera gout rheumatism, tic
doloreux, sciatica, lockaw and cancer, invariably
disappeared from every patient respectively and
renty afflicted with any all of these diseases af
ter the third box.
Mr. Smiths ingenuity not exhausted
with these arran gements. He understood his bust
perfectly, and felt that, in order to make his
pill go down, it necessary to the patron
age of peer of the realm. With this view he en-
tered into negotiations with poor nobeman resi-
ding abroad. The transaction was long time pen.
ding but at length it was signed and sealed between
Mir: Smith and the Earl of Rottenborough that his
ordship should, for and in consideration of the sum
of six hundred per annum, to be paid to him, the
Earl of Rottenborough by the said Mr.. Smith,
sent to be cured in public advertisements by means
which the said MIR. Smith might choose to call upon
him, the Earl aforesaid, to testify he had been cur
ed. Under these auspices Mr.. Smiths Pills had
thriyed exceedingly; but it not until Mr.. Smith
conferred upon himself diploma. and inducted
himself into the chair in college which he endow-
ed, for that single purpose, somewhere, that the Uni
yersal Pill was found in every respectable house in
the three kingdoms, the special and particular
pill of Professor Smith, NJ D.; without whose sigma
ture all others were spurious
| Poor PratteS ! How cOuld ho rhoh had not t,vnn
ty pounds in the world, hope to compete with the
rich Professor Smith ? When he recounted the ad-
vantages which his rival possessed and reflected up
on his moneyless condition, he was ready to
give up his idea in despair At this crisis of his
fate his wife, one day, in purest jest told him that
care would make him look as old as Methusaleh-
This simple remark, he afectngly tells at the pres
ent time. decided him. He would have Methusa-
leh Pill! His wife tried hard to persuade him from
embarking in expensive speculation, but he was
deaf to her pleading. He wrote forthwith to his
cousin, who was chemist at Bath, and asked him
to mix him harmless pill. Let the properties it
contains neutraIiZe another" This was the
simple direction. A bribe of a third share in the
speculation decided his cousin, the chemist to set
to work Immediately The next step was to frame
very learned history of the pill-to trace its de-
scent from Methusaleh to Prattles. With this OBJ
ect, Pratles consulted battered old schoolmaster
of his acquaintance, whose scraps of ancient lore
sufRced for the printers purpose. In few hours a
very interesting story, narratng the history of the
receipt was fabricated and ready for the press. 1t
follows:
" 1T IS WELL KNOWN TO MOST PEOPLE THAT THE
VENERABLE METHUsALEH LIVED TO THE GOOD OLD
AGE OF NINE HUNDRED AND SIXTY NINE
YEARS! The secret of so long life has, for ages
remained IMPENETRABLE MYSTERY! In
these degenerate days seldom live to gaze upon
their grandchildren but in the days of Methusaleb
matters were very different. Men lived for centu-
ries. What potent power-what subtle elixir-beld
body and soul together for so long period? That
is the question: About two years ago, two gentle
men travelling in THE ARID DESERTS OF
ASIA MINOR! They fell in one evening, with an
encampment of Arabs. They were most Hospitality
received by the Mussulmen. The first peculiarity
they remarked among the Arabs was, that there
were several men in the encampment who, though
they locke very old, were, nevertheless active in
their gait and lively in conversation Our travellers
entered into conversation with one Of these hoary
sons of the desert the old man was very communi-
| cative.
"' was in your country many years ago when
Charles the Second was king | played tricks be.
fore him he was iovial fellow! An! was a
/ young man them and the old man heaved deem
sigh.
"The travellers, it may we'll be imagined, we're
surprised, and, at first, somewhat incredulous
':'There is & raan-but he is very old now-who
/ tough in Palestine when of your kings sons
helped in a very foolish war; think you Christians
call it the Holy War The old man pointed to a
old man, whose bair white as silver. That
man. continued the Arab, who was addressing the
travellers, is upwards of six hundred wears old
as Incredible' = our travellers exclaimed.
s's Hush p the old Arab continued you of the
degenerate west know nothing of the matter. The
secret remains with us-to you it is unknown-an
undiscovered mystery Have you ever heard of Me-