Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1883-11-24
Some Popular Dclusfons.

deadly and most obstinate OF
| ailments. According to recent &C
counts, the Hoang-nan of that country
is a miraculous plant, which, since tar
water fell into disrepute, is the nearest
approach to the universal cure. The
bark of this wondrous herb is, if we are
to believe the tales in circulation, even
more medicinal than the molu that
Hermes gave to Ulysses, for it is a SOW
ereign remedy, not only against hydro
phobia, which has hitherto deiied the
faculty, but against leprosy and the bite
of venomous reptiles. 1t instantly
cures the maladies mentioned, but at
the same time it admits of no trifling.
for it proves "a violent poison in cases
where it is not applicable" The heal
ing virtues of this new blessing to man.
kind were, until a short time ago, only
known to a single Anamite family. but
on their conversion to Christianity the
secret was communicated to M. Lesser
teur, formerly q missionary in Tonquin,
and the author Of a work which bears
most cogent testimony to his simple
minded credulity. But we have still to
learn that specimens have arrived in
Europe, and that through it's powerful
aid the leper has been made whole, or
the bitten man purged of the mad dogs
venom. In fact, the entire story is a
familiar one, for ever since the inven-
ton of medicine a panacca was being
discovered which was to render the
pharmacopeia of no avail. Usually, of
late, the secret has been an heirloom in
some v family, only to be revealed
at a cost in blankets or beads, or new
rum, ruinous to the philanthropist, and
invariably when obtained as absolutely
worthless as any charm to be found
within the %boundaies Of that prolific
f~olk-medicine on which Mr.. Black has
| penned so voluminous a treatise. There
is no disease to which flesh is heir but
has been the object of these wonder
working remedies. Now it is leprosy,
anon hydrophobia, and again and again
until no one cares to keep the tale of
their numberthere have been announced
''perfect cures" for the bite of the
most venomous snake known to the
ophiologist. But the cobra still de-
stroys its thousands every yearin India;
hydrophobia, at the very existence of
which 1T was at one time the fashion to
sheer, claims it's annual roll of victims,
and the Sandwich Islands Government,
hopeless of any can Of stamping out
the foul disease which is decimating
Hawaii removes every leper the mo-
ment the symptoms of the malady APP
pear to a lonely Isle of Molokat, there
to remain till he dies.
From the time that he first knew toll
and decay man has been seeking a
means either of vanquishipg death, of
outwitting old age, or of growing rich
without the expenditure of labor. Now
the search is for the elixir of life; at an
other time for the philosophers stone
and the power of transmutation. Juan
Ponce de Leon spent long years in
search OF the Bahaman fountain of per-
petual youth, but he duly died in spite
OF it's miraculous waters. Sir John Man
deville-or whoever wrote under that
name-tells us that at P%lombe-or. as
we now call it, Ouilon-on the Malabar
coast, he also had quenched his thirst at
a wellof rejuvenescence, though it is sad
to hear that when in old age, he re-
crossed that sea which in the heyday Of
his manhood he had passed con the
feast of St. Michael" he was in the ag-
onies Of arthritic govt, and, as a conso-
lation for his ''wretched rest" composed
the "boke'' which obtained for hun the
distinction Of being the ''father of Eng
fish prose-" Sir John Hill was no more
fortunate, for, Notwithstanding the eff
cacy of his tincture of Bardana as a
specific for gout, he succumbed to that
disease. Indeed, the remedy for that
malady is still to be found, and is likely
to keep the philosophers for a long time
at work, for though there is a Jack
sonian professor in Cambridge who is
hound by the conditions laid down by
the founder of his chair to "discover a
cure for the gout,' the learned incum-
bent, instead of bending his intellect to
to this momentous task, passes his time
in spectroscoping the sun, or in extract
ing alkaloids for which nobody cares
out Of something that no one else can
eat. Even the art of ''making beautiful
forever has not lost it's charms for
middle-aged ladies, and were a second
Cagilostro to vaunt a liquid warranted
to render the wrinkled bag an incarna-
ton of immortal loneliness, the all
believing world who help pill-venders
to great fortunes would hasten to pur-
chase the precious fluid. Twenty years
ago a Chinese doctor-or a barbarian
who personated that character-created
something OF a Juror in San Francisco.
He prescribed for every disease, at the
same time enjoining a strict regimen,
without which his medicines would not
only fail to cure, but would actually
kill. The result was miraculous. Epi-
cures bore with equanimitv a sentence
OF rice water and dry toast, in terror of
the Chinaman's medicine working their
doom, and ladies who turned day into
night recovered when they followed his
implicit directions, unconscious that the
physic was simply a means for fright
eningg the patients into obedience to the
h!ygienic appliances which accompanied
it. A similar tale is told of the Anamite
plant, which cures all, or kills those
who recklessly abuse it's virtues, and
the student of folklore does not needto
be reminded that the identical proper-
ties are attributed to all the ordeal
drugs which form so prominent a fea-
ture in the rude jurisprudence of inner
Atrlca.-L0ndon Standard.
The Atlanta Constitution. sneakinr