The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1900-01-24
HORRIBLE REMEDIES
THOSE USED BY DOCTORS IN The
SIXTEENTH CENTURY.

SIXTEENTH CENTURY.
Patients Cast Into Wells to Cure
ConvuIsions-A Ladder Used In Set
ting ~ DisIocated Shoulder--Dead
Bodies Made Into Medicine.
4 fragment of curious volume has
fallen into the hands of loyal physi-
elan which graphically describes the
methods of surgery of several centuries
ago. When 1t Is considered that anes-
thetics were unknown In those ancient
days the modus operandi of the sur
geon OF the sixteenth century must mp
pear startlingly cruel in the light of
the present day.
The work Is that of Ambrose Parey,
who In 1870, being then the much ia
nous "ehlrurgion" Of his day, publish
ed a bulky volume which became such
an established authority and held It's
place for so long time that 10 years
afterward II was translated into Eng
llsh and published In London.
In his first book he considers the gem
eral phenomenon of the body In health
and disease, and In the chapter relnt-
ing to temperaments and humors he
writes, AN humor Is called by physi-
clans what thing soeyer is liquid and
flowing In the body of living creatures
inclosed with blood" Proceeding to
the manifold divisions of humors,"
he separates them into four parts, dis
tinct In color, taste, effects and quail
ties-namely, blood, phlegm, choler and
melancholy. Exact In his subdivisions,
he says: "All men ought to think that
such humors are wont to move mt set
hours of the day as by a certain pc
cullar motion or tide. Therefore, the
blood flows from the ninth hour of the
night to the third hour of the day;
choler to the ninth of the day. Then
melancholy the blood flows from the
ninth hour of the night Is under the
dominion of phlegm."
Equally curious is the following on
spirits, which he divides Into "ani-
MALL" vital" and "naturall:"
1.-THE animal spirit hath taken his
seat in the brain. 1t is called animal
because 1t is the life, but the chief and
prime instrument thereof. Wherefore
1t hath n most subtle and aery sub
stance. This animal spirit is made
and harbored in the windings and fold
lngs of the veins and arteries of the
brain, brought thither sometimes of
the pure air or sweet yapor drawn In
by the nose In breathing. The vital
spirit Is next to 1t In dignity and eX-
eelleney, which hath Its chief mansion
In the left ventriele of the heart, The
natural spirit, II such there be any,
hath It's station In the liver and veins"
Describing certain juggling and de-
ceitful ways of healing of cures by
such means as fear, surprise and even
by music for spider bite. the music
causing the patient to dance so Justify
that he shakes all the poison out OF his
system" he sums up some of those
heroic remedies thus: II would not
cast the patient headlong out of n
window, but would rather cast them
sodainly, and thinking of no such
thing into II great cistern filled with
cold water, with their heads foremost.
Neither would | take them out until
they had drunk good quantity of
strong fear the matter causing the
frenzy might be carried from above
downward from the noble parts to the
ignoble."
4 medicine upon which he dilates ut
great length Is "mummie," referred to
as the usual remedy for Commissions,
and he describes it as follows:
"Mummle Is n liquor flowing from
the aromatick embalmens of dead bod,
les, which becomes dry and hard' and
being ground into medicine was "ad-
mlnistored either IN whole or portion
to such as have fallen from high
places, the first and last medicine of
almost all our practitioners at this day
In such ease"
He also gives some grewsome facts
connected with the preparation of
"mummIe" when he says: Certain of
our French apothecaries, men won
drous audaclous and coyctous to steal
by night the bodies of such as were
hanged and embalming them with salt
and drugs they dried them In an oven
so as to sell them thus adultcrated in
stead of true mummle. whcreupon we
IRE thus compelled, both foollshly and
cruelty, to deyour the nangled and
putrid particles of the carcasses OF the
basest people of Egypt, or of such as
are hanged, as though there were no
other way TO help or recover one bruls-
ed with fall from n high place.
81 have not thought II fit In this
place." he says, ito omit the Industry
of Nicholas Picart, the Duke of Gulse,
his surgeon, who, being called to n GER
tain countryman to sci his shoulder
being out Of joint, and finding none In
the place besides the patient and his
wife, who might assist him In this
work, he put the patient, bound after
the aforementioned manner, TO n ladder
then Immediately he tyed a static at
the lower end Of the ligature which
was fastened about the patients arm
above his elbow, then put 1t so tyed I'M
der one of the steps of the ladder as
low as he could and got astride there
upon and safe thereon with his whole
weight and at the same instant made
his wife pluck the stool from under his
feet, which, being done, the bone pres
emily came into its place"
He also graycly discusses witches
and witchcraft. the birth Of monsters
with horns. hoofs and wings, ascrlbing
their birth 20 the master of evil, and
closes With a lofty pancgyrlc upon Hip
pocrates and Galen. the princes OF ply
sicians. -- Cincinnati Enquirer.
---==-----s--
Better Name.
Miss Summit-He is one Of the most
generous men ever met. Why. he took