Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1889-12-12
PATENT MEDICINES.
How Almost Everyone Insists on Us
ING Them for Aches and Palms.

times. A prosperous druggist in New
York doctors more persons by recon-
mending and selling patent cure-aiis
than any ten physicians in town. Men
form the habit of prescribing for them
selves with a distinct formula that,
taken in toto, rivals the pharmacopeia.
After too heavy or frequent drinking
thew dose themselves with aromatic
shirts of ammonia or acid phosphate !;
a tinge of rheumatism sends them TO a
druggist for St. Somebody's OIL; a
tired feeling too prolonged suggests 10
them course of tincture OF iron; Tor
coughs and colds every man seems TO
have his own patent remedy, so nu-
merous are they; patent preparations
of pepsin, patent after dinner piiis,
mineral waters, and veritable host
of compounds, pellets, and draughts
are resorted to against dyspepsia.
But the list is endless. To appreciate
it one should stand in popular phar-
macist's shop and hear the people as
they converse with the clerks, two
thirds of them ordering their own
remedies, and the others explaining
their ailments and asking for prescrip-
tons.
Patent medicines rise and fall like
tie waves of the sea. They are as
much dependent upon continuous adj
vertising as upon whatever merits they
may possess. The signs upon the
walls and the trade marks in the news
papers of 1868 would seem familiar as
household words to a man of 40 years
of age, but would convey no meaning
to a youth of 81. rs. L. 1S60-X.,"
the trade mark of bitters, and sup
posed to stand for "Started Trade in
1860 with Sl0." stared at the public
from every dead wall and newspaper
at the close of the war, but that great
gold mine to its proprietors has been
worked out and succeeded by one after
another of at least three similar nos
trums in the last two decades.
But there is always uppermost at
least one special medicine for each of
the common ailments, and the trade in
them is enormous. The physicians of
Brooklyn were so disturbed by the
volume of business they fancied them
selves cheated of by patent medicines
that three or four years ago they
formed a combination which aimed TO
bring the druggists to terms and TO
lead them not to push the patent
remedies. Each doctor agreed to
make up his own prescriptions without
extra charge rather than swell the
business OF the offending druggists.
But, of course, it did not work. 1t
entailed too much bother upon the |
busy doctors, and as for the struggling
ones, who were the kecnest sufferers.
they were allowed TO struggle. That
is the rule of the world, every time.
There is a remarkable craze for
doctoring the nerves just now. Both
sexes are victimizing themselves with
all sorts of powerful sedatives like
chloral and sulphonal and less harmful
salts like bromide of potassium.
Shrewd women, approaching the weak
ness of their sex in this respect, are
pushing patent preparations to lull dis
ordered nerves. Those women to
whom dissipation is a business, and
those to whom it is a fashionable re-
quirement, sustain their nervous sys-
tenn upon choral. The women led the
men IN this respect, but to-day the
druggists keep scores of standard
special nerve medicines for male Gus
toners. The craze is more than
foolish, it is wicked. The drugs that
are used bring relief only for the time
being and in the end leave the nervous
system shattered, if not wrecked. The
best nerve medicines are plenty of
sleep, regular habits, free move
ment of the bowels, clear conscience
and fixed intention to drop business
after business hours.
The New York doctors who have
been questioned about patent medi-
zines are not of the class that would
feel any loss to their purses by the sale
If these compounds, yet all discourage
heir use. This would be of no value
mless these doctors advanced good
'easons against what they condemn.
But they do.
'sThe patent medicines that are of
most good" said one of the most ia
nous physicians in town, ''are those
which come from some scientific or
Expert doctors prescription. Perhaps
he Sun cholera medicine is as good
In example of a safe and effective
specific as one could call to mind. But as
| rule, patent medicines do world of
larm. They do this not because they are
Ill essentially harmful in themselves but
because they prevent the persons who
Use them from approaching the causes
# their illnesses. What cures they
fleet are ut the best only temporary.
They serve precisely the end that a
nan gains by tearing off the top of
weed in his garden. The root is left,
md the weed reappears. A man who
'oes to doctor finds out how and
Why he is out of order; often the
'why' is most important. Without
the cause of ones illness it is