Genre:

Essay, Drollery

Subjects:

Medical Treatment, Mental Illness, Gender, Domestic Economy

    Discusses the attempt by a 'mental physician to the State', Dr Punch, to check the disease of potichomania, a craze for imitating oriental porcelain vessels, 'to which the female mind alone is subject'. Notes that the symptoms include 'the weak propensity among young ladies to transmogrify good glass into bad porcelain' and the corresponding 'accidental smashing' of 'claret jugs and wine decanters'. Concludes by reporting that Dr Punch's suggested treatment is 'a course of wholesome ridicule, by which the patient may be laughed out of her insanity'.