The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1868-03-04
A MYSTERIOUS DEATH.

1t becomes our melancholy duty to announce
that the eminent physician and friend OF hui
mainly, "Dr. Blood, " is no more He sud-
denly departed this lite last week, and the
places that knew him lin the newspapers
know him no more There is mysterious
silence among them all as to the cause of his
death-not even the slightest allusion to the
event itself As we have spoken so freely of
the merits of this illustrious benefactor of
mankind, it is only fitting We should tell what
little can be gathered concerning his affecting
and tragical end.
1t is understood that some of his friends
who had been publishing for the relief of ''suf-
fering humanity, the virtues of that incom-
parable g Orygeaized DIR, inconsiderately
requested the Doctor to be so obliging as to
establish an affinity between the Air" afore-
said, and the article called gold 1t was a
perilous experiment, and he was reluctant
He was prepared to give them any quantity of
''Oxygenizcd Air to clear 'Catarrhs" out of
their heads so perfectly that they should here
after have their senses exercised sufficiently to
''smell rat, or discern huna-bug afar off /;
but as to establishing any special connection
between his Air" and such vulgar thing as
gold--that was contrary to nature, it being a law
of chemistry that there is no affinity whatever
between that metal and Oxygen in any of its
forms.
The Doctors friends, however, were unfor-
tunately possessed with the idea that the af
fair was to be treated commercially instead of
chemically, and were urgent. Not being ac-
quainted with minute details, it is enough to
relate briefly the mournful fact, that in the
desperate attempt to establish the connection
afore mentioned, DIR. Blood's Onygenized
AT' seems somehow to have got mysterious
ly mixed up with things in general that did mt
agree with its constitution, and tremendous
explosion followed, which Immediately killed
the DR.. stone dead, and sorely wounded a
number of his friends.
Who was it, (or was it anybody? p that was
overheard in a mournful solloquy on the street
the other day, when such detached passages and
quotations as these caught the ear" erumpa,
ecas't, a6iit erpIoditur, mortuus est \ \ \
A whole column lost" mo pay;" "Slngs
and arrows OF outrageous fortune;" I'm
seas in Blood !" bad Blood, that" Z" Hum
bug" Ubiquitous impostor;" Central
about right, after all. "We ne'er
shall look upon his like again, &c.
As to that last, surviving friends and ad-
mirers may derive whatever consolation the
undOubted fact can administer that there is a
large family of little Bloods left, who will
doubtless, in due time, want column for their
dear fathers "0XYGENIZED AIR." or some
thing else quite as airy, and gaseous. Who
can say they will not get it? seeing this unset
fish philanthopist, this admirable DR.. Blood,
so intensely bent on clearing the nostrils of all
mankind from "Catarrhs," is precisely the
very sort of man of whom it may be said
Many shall draw after him, as there were
innumerable before him. qa.
With this brief obituary notice, we tender
our coincidence to the surviving and especially
the ,oounded friends of the deceased, remind
ing them of the comforting thought, at least
the memorable law, that - The best Of friends
must sometimes part 4"