the excessive pain absolutely requires the extraction of the tooth, the place which it occupied should be washed with water in which honey and salt have been dissolved, and the tooth replaced. The practitioner, however, need not tie himself down to the procedure here described, but may pursue any other that is equally applicable in its stead. To the Physician. SIR,-Your papers seem to me to evince a liberality of principle which induces me to propose to you to take some public notice of a communication which I have just received from a friend on the Continent. It relates to a subject of considerable interest-an infallible cure for a painful disorder, which, if verified by experience, would cut off an important branch of the practice and profits of you medical gentlemen, and relieve your unfortunate patients at the expense of nothing more than a sufficient dose of faith and prayer. There is not, I should presume, a member of your profession in the United Kingdom, but is acquainted with the history of the wonderful cure of a nun belonging to some Catholic institution or other in Essex, through the interposition of a German prince, Alexander von Hohenlohe, as attested by the learned physician to the establishment. Be it farther known then to you, and to all whom it may concern, that the said Prince of Hohenlohe has recently published at Bamberg a religious tract, to which is appended a paper, which serves to let the uninitiated into the secret of his process for the cure of bodily diseases, and incontestably proves that our most notorious nostrum-mongers, our Brodums, our Solomons, our Williamses, and our Whitelaws, are mere fools in comparison with this prince of quacks and miracleworkers. The paper in question, which bears the title of An Effective Prayer against Gout (or Palsy, for the German word includes both disorders) is as follows:-+ "In the name of God the Father, &c. &c. &c. Amen. "I, N. N. conjure thee, gout, by the holy five wounds, and by the innocent blood of my Lord Jesus Christ, which flowed out of his holy five wounds for the salvation of us men on earth +++. I conjure thee, gout, by the last judgment and by the severe sentence which God will pronounce on all mankind, and on all sinners, male and female, that thou harm not any of the members of my body-neither my brain, nor my eyes, nor my shoulders, nor my back, nor my heart, nor my loins, nor my arms, nor my thighs, nor my legs, nor my toes, nor any of the members of my whole body +++. I conjure thee, gout, by the three nails which were driven through the blessed hands and feet of Jesus Christ, by the saints who stood on both sides of the cross of our Redeemer Jesus Christ at the time of his crucifixion, namely, the most Blessed Virgin and Mother of God, Mary, St. John, and all the saints who were present at the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus Christ. In this confidence I trust that, through the intercession of St. Barbara, God will, if it be conducive to my salvation, avert the gout from me, and confer on me all good things. Ah! gracious Lord, save me, I pray thee, from this disease, the gout. I pray thee by the cords, bonds, and nails by which our Redeemer was secured, bound and nailed to the holy cross, that +++ for the sake of his sufferings he would bestow his grace on me and all men +++. I conjure thee, gout, that thou depart, by the divine love in heaven and on earth +++. May every species of this disease depart from me, whether it be―[here follow some of these species, for which I shall not pretend to give you the technical appellations, but merely a literal translation of the original]-the cold gout, the running gout, the burning gout, the raging gout, the flying gout, the gout in the loins, the gout in the side, the seventyseven gouts, that they do no harm to my body. So help me the holy divine power, with which Jesus Christ suffered his cruel death on the cross, in his holy grave in which he himself lay, and whence he gloriously rose, and has redeemed the human race. Dearest Lord and Saviour, make me sound in soul and body! Grant this, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost! Amen." "Whoever hath the gout, let him come and turn to the recollection of the sufferings of Jesus, and to the name Jesus Nazarenus Rex Judæorum. Whoever reads or has read it, whether our friend or foe, brother or sister, and carries this prayer with him, and lives according to its precepts, will be delivered from the gout, and not be attacked by it; for he who suffered the shameful death of the holy cross was our blessed Lord Jesus Christ: this is the Lord of heaven and earth; he condescends to relieve us and to take away the gout from us, so that we may never have it again, or to preserve us from it altogether. "Let every one say, as long as he lives, every day in honour of the members of Jesus Christ, five Paternosters and five Ave marias, together with the Creed." Such, observes my friend, is the prayer and such the direction appended at Bamberg in the year 1822, to a religious tract destined for the use of the lower classes, and which bears on the face of it the name of the Prince of Hohenlohe. Should it be really by this prince, priest, and worker of miracles, gouty believers will at least feel deeply indebted to him for making them acquainted with this remedy, and thus sparing them the trouble and expense of a journey to his reverence— unless, indeed, he may have staggered their faith a little, by directing them in the prayer to hope that the gout will be averted, if it be conducive to their salvation; whereas the subjoined exhortation promises unconditionally to every one, even though a foe (meaning us heretics, I suppose), who shall carry this prayer about him, and live agreeably to its precepts (but where, in the name of wonder, are these precepts for a Christian life to be found in it?) that he shall be relieved from the gout, or exempted from it altogether. You, Sir, may possibly suspect that this precious composition itself must be afflicted with the gout, since there are parts in which it hobbles most lamentably. I have been more solicitous to present you with a faithful transcript of the original than to cure it of any of its constitutional defects, which I leave to your management, being, Sir, your obedient servant, but No PHYSICIAN. London, April 25, 1823. THE DIVER, A BALLAD TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN "WHERE is the man who will dive for his King, It roar'd, and it drizzled, it hiss'd and it whirl'd, It seem'd that the womb of the ocean would bear It thunder'd again as the wave gather'd slow, And now ere the waves had returned from the deep, And then there succeeded a horrible pause And stiller it grew on the watery waste, "The high-hearted stripling is whelm'd in the tide, Ah! wail him," was echoed from every side. "If the monarch had buried his crown in the pool It drizzled, it thunder'd, it hiss'd and it whirl'd, But, ah! what is that on the wave's foamy brim, 66 Long life to the monarch! how happy are they I felt myself seized, with the quickness of thought But God in his mercy, for to him alone And then I look'd downward, and horribly deep, The black-bellied whale, and the slumbering craken. The daughter heard that with compassionate thought, He has done what no other would venture to do, And share as a husband the joys of her bed." Then the pride of old Eirin arose in his look, And it flash'd from his eye-balls courageously keen, One glance on the beautiful vision he took, And he saw her change colour, and sink on the green. By the stool of Saint Peter the prize I'll obtain ;" He shouted, and instantly dived in the main. The waters sunk down, and a thundering peal G. O. B. |