Punch,  36 (1859), 128–29.

The Donkey's Medical Guide

Anon

Genre:

News-Commentary, Drollery

Subjects:

Quackery, Medical Treatment, Medical Practitioners, Disease, Commerce, Periodicals


    Ridicules an advertisement in the North British Advertiser for James Greer's miraculous pills, directed to ignorant Scotsmen. Notes that the treatment is supported by the case of William Shaw, who claimed that his debilitating and potentially fatal illnesses were cured by taking Greer's pills, but Punch considers Shaw's case to be 'emphysema, or windy swelling, of that species in which the patient assumes the character of a human puff'. Goes on to attack a Morning Post advertisement for Thomas Holloway's pills and ointments. Agrees with the advertisement that the treatments are 'incomparable', but in the sense that 'medicines that cannot be compared to any that are good for anything', and argues that these medicines 'subjugate entirely without demanding of the patient the knowledge that he has even anything the matter with him'. (128) Notes the claim that 'no organ in the body can long resist the combined action of these remedies', but that neither can any organ resist the effect of 'prussic acid and arsenic'. Concludes by criticizing the Morning Post for providing an 'organ' for Thomas Holloway. (128–29)



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