client: that in giving the said false statement he was actuated by interested motives: that "in running down" the merits of the Cardiac Tincture, his object was to introduce some other medicine, from the sale of which he would receive benefit. As a proof of the interested views of the editor, he emphatically observed, the very same number contains a most scurrilous sketch of Dr. Ainslie, than whom there was not a more able physician, learned and good man, in this kingdom; he was an ornament to the profession. The Doctor was indeed, in the opinion of Mr. Gurney, as respectable a practitioner, and as injured a man, as the experienced Surgeon Rymer.

The part of the article Mr. Rymer and his able legal advisers had pronounced libellous, was read, to the no small amusement of the jury, &c.; his own representation of his coat of arms, with which he sealed his medicine, to prevent imposition, also occasioned much

merriment.

Mr. Balfour, clerk to the navy office, proved that Mr. Rymer had been appointed surgeon to a ship in his Majesty's service, in the year 1780.

Mr. Stevens, clerk in the office of Messrs. Marsh and Co. said that Mr. Rymer continued to receive half-pay as a navy surgeon.

Mr. Charles Whithorne produced the patent granted by his late Majesty to Mr. Rymer, surgeon, &c. his heirs and assigns, for his fortunate discovery,-the Cardiac Tincture. During the reading of the specification, the court was frequently in a roar of laughter. Of the con

sistency of the composition, the jury, and indeed every person in court, appeared as capable to form an opinion as the learned counsel, or the experienced Surgeon Rymer. The effect it produced on the court was evidently not very agreeable to the Surgeon's Advocates.

Mr. Steele, an apothecary of Ryegate, as if determined to support the inflexibility of his name, courageously entered the box, in defence of the professional character of Mr. Rymer. He stated, that he had known Mr. Rymer twenty years; that he had been practising surgery in Ryegate about that time, and that he had met him in consultation. On cross-examination by Mr. Scarlett, he admitted, apparently with reluctance, that he had never prescribed the celebrated Cardiac Tincture; that it could not be proper for diseases so opposite in their nature as those for which it was recommended, and that it could not possess properties so opposite as those noticed in the Surgeon's advertisement, He was not examined as to the virtues of the articles specified in the specification, or the pharmaceutical or chemical character of the compound, He confessed enough to confirm the justness of our remarks on the probable effects of the nostrum, under certain circumstances, or in different stages of the same disease. The learned counsel thought it also unnecessary to question him as to the other nostrums Surgeon Rymer prepares, viz. a bilious pill, a remedy for consumption, a tooth-powder, &c.!!!

The Rev. Mr. Jordan, the classical Vicar of Hoo*, near Rochester,

* We understand this name was given to the parish, in consequence its being very much frequented by owls.

of

swore, that he had received benefit from Mr. Rymer's Cardiac Tincture, in a case of palsy of the head, many years ago. He had given him permission to publish his case. On cross-examination, he confessed he was ignorant of the cause of the palsy; all he knew was, that the palsy was in his head. (Paralized brain, we presume!!) He thought it was from determination of blood to the brain. He was of a spare habit, and long neck!! The name of palsy of the head was given to the complaint by himself!!

Richard Turner Pooler, followed the Vicar of Hoo. He stated, that be had received considerable benefit from the Cardiac Tincture, when afflicted with indigestion and general debility of the system, in the year 1797. On cross-examination, he admitted that his complaints were produced by Green Tea, which he left off, when he commenced taking the Cardiac Tincture, and that he also took an extra glass of Port wine !!!

Miss Barbara Pickford, a bashful maid of forty, of a very prepos sessing appearance, and with the diffidence peculiar to her age, stated, that she had derived benefit from the Cardiac Tincture, in a case of spasm in the stomach, the cause of which she either did not know, or would not confess. She admitted that Mr. Rymer did not attend her family at that or any other time, and that she was induced to give the nostrum a trial, in consequence of the Surgeon's advertisement. She and her family had been always attended by Mr. Martin, a respectable surgeon of Ryegate, who, we understand, had never the honour of meeting Mr. Rymer in consultation; and who, like every man of science, abhors every thing in the shape of quackery, either regular or irregular.

Mr. Cresswell, servant to Messrs. Dicey and Co., the agents of Mr. Rymer, for all his nostrums, swore, that the sale of the celebrated Cardiac Tincture, within the last year, had fallen off. He was not questioned as to the sale of the Surgeon's other nostrums.

Mr. Gurney, looking towards Mr. Scarlett, observed, that the evidence of the last witness closed his case. This he did, with an expression of countenance that clearly indicated that the evidence brought forward by the attorney or his client, and the scientific specification of Surgeon Rymer, had not kept up the effect of his luminously argumentative, and very liberal address, on the minds of the Jury. The countenance of bis prompter, the attorney, gave us the idea, that he was aware that the evidence had completely failed to establish the leading features of Mr. Gurney's encheering speech, viz. that our attack on the professional character, and wonder-working Cardiac Tincture of Surgeon Rymer, was wantonly cruel and interested.

Mr. Scarlett, after observing to Mr. Phillips, that the action only merited contempt and derision, and that to call a witness to confirm the justness of our criticism on the Cardiac Tincture, and accuracy of our analysis, would be giving it a degree of consequence it by no means deserved, with his usual ease and ability thus addressed the Jury:-Have we then, gentlemen, lived to the day, when notorious nostrum-mongers may bring actions for criticisms on their infallible specifics, and on their practices? Are men of science to be brought before courts of justice for ridiculing their empiricism, and pointing out to the unwary the hazard of taking their deleterious drugs? This gentleman had sent forth into the world a panacea for disorders of the most opposite

symptoms and qualities, holding out health and vigour to the patient, in cases where the medicine might produce sudden death, and was not a man of science to be at liberty to detect the imposition, and warn the public against the danger they incurred? Such spirited publications were of vast public benefit, because they enabled persons who had not access to large medical and scientific libraries, to detect fraud and imposition. The supposed libel was nothing more than a fair criticism upon the plaintiff's quackery, and if it was mixed with a little ridicule, it was the more likely to be salutary in its effect. In this point of view the case fell precisely within the rule laid down by Lord Ellenborough, in Sir John Carr v. Hood; in which the plaintiff was ridiculed as the jaunting-car. In that case a witness was called to prove, that in consequence of reading a criticism in The Edinburgh Review, upon the plaintiff's book, he had declined reading his works, upon which the learned judge congratulated him upon the escape he had had, and told him, that he was the better for it. So in this case, how many people must be the better for not having taken the plaintiff's nostrum, in consequence of the warning voice of the defendant? The plaintiff professed to cure no less than 16 mortal diseases, by the all-powerful influence of his tincture; and amongst its other virtues, it was calculated to cure timidity! Would that, if such were its virtues, the plaintiff would be good enough to ship off a cargo of his medicine to the kingdom of Naples, and inspire its inhabitants to the vigorous assertion of its political rights. On this occasion, he could not refrain from relating a story of the celebrated Dr. Solomon, who amassed an immense fortune by his Balm of Gilead, which he sold at 10s. 6d. a bottle. The doctor had shipped a cargo of it for America, estimating each bottle at one shilling, in order to evade the duty. The custom-house officer suspecting that this was the doctor's object, and that the medicine was worth a great deal more, made a seizure of the cargo; and the doctor refusing to pay the duty, he said he would let the officer have the cargo at a shilling a bottle, and the officer accordingly took it. The doctor then shipped another and a larger cargo, and the same consequence followed, the officer taking the cargo at a shilling a bottle. He immediately opened a warehouse himself for the sale of Dr. Solomon's Balm of Gilead, but finding that he could not sell it for half-a-guinea a bottle, began to suspect that it was not worth so much, and, upon a communication with the doctor, he confessed the fact, and boasted that the officer could not sell it, for that he, the doctor, could, by his advertisements, declare that it was not genuine; adding, that he was very well paid for his medicine at a shilling a bottle, for that all the medicine he had made, did not cost him more than two puncheons of rum, by which he had amassed an immense fortune, and purchased a large estate. Were quacks, therefore, to continue their impositions on the public with impunity, and were men of science to be punished for exposing their tricks to ridicule? The subject of such quackery had been most admirably ridiculed by a celebrated writer, whose writings became more valuable as they grew older. Dr. Goldsmith, in his Chinese Letters, speaking of quacks, said, "When I consider the assiduity of this profession, their benevolence amazes me. They not only in general give their medicines for half value, but use the most persuasive remonstrances to induce the sick to come and be cured.

Sure there must be something strangely obstinate in an English patient, who refuses so much health upon such easy terms! Does he take a pride in being bloated with a dropsy? Does he find pleasure in the alternations of an intermittent fever, or feel as much satisfaction in nursing up his gout, as he found pleasure in acquiring it? He must; otherwise he would never reject such repeated assurances of instant relief. What can be more convincing than the manner in which the sick are invited to be well? The Doctor first begs the most earnest attention of the public to what he is going to propose; he solemnly affirms the pill was never found to want success; he produces a list of those who have been rescued from the grave by taking it. Yet, notwithstanding all this, there are many here who now and then think proper to be sick! Only sick! did I say? There are some who even think proper to die. Yes, by the head of Confucius, they die, though they might have purchased the healthrestoring specific for half-a-crown at every corner." Would the jury then, in the present case, give the plaintiff a verdict, for that which was but a legitimate exposure of his quackery, without malice, or any ill intention imputable to the defendant?

Mr. Scarlett did not condescend to notice the scurrilous part of Mr. Gurney's address; he treated it with that contempt which, on the minds of men of any discernment or feeling, has the most mortifying effect, viz. silence. Indeed, as a gentleman, we could not expect Mr. Scarlett even to glance at his insinuations.

As soon as Mr. Scarlett finished his address, the foreman of the Jury, apparently with the intention to save the Lord Chief Justice the trouble of summing up, or commenting on the evidence, gave a verdict for the defendant.

Mr. Gurney immediately rose, and with an air of triumph, emphatically observed to the Judge, that the defendant had not answered their charge of a libel on the PROFESSIONAL character of Mr. Rymer; and therefore, on that charge his client was entitled to a verdict. The defendant had stated that he, Surgeon Rymer, was no doubt as much entitled to the rank or denomination of Surgeon as that of Esquire. He defied the defendant or his attorney to prove that Surgeon Rymer had styled himself Esquire in an advertisement, or in any of his publications.

Mr. Phillips immediately pointed out a letter in the Surgeon's Treatise on the Cardiac Tincture, which was addressed to James Rymer, Esq.!! This letter, Mr. Gurney observed, was not written by Mr. Rymer !! It was published by Mr. Rymer; and if he was aware that he was not entitled to the distinction, why did he not erase it? The publication of a title by himself, although given by a correspondent, in our humble opinion, is equal to the assumption of it; at any rate, it implies that he was conscious of deserving it. The Lord Chief Justice observed, that every person who possesses a smattering knowledge of medicine, now styles himself a surgeon; and as for esquires, every person above a menial servant is so styled, and there was no doubt that many who were styled surgeons, were more entitled to the denomination of esquire than that of surgeon. In summing up, his Lordship made some very pertinent remarks on the baneful traffic of quackery, and very emphatically observed, (as we understood his Lordship) that regular surgeons do not deal in nostrums or patent medicines; and when a surgeon

embarks in such a traffic, he could not see how his professional character could be separated from his nostrum, or from the practice connected with it. The Jury, without the least hesitation, repeated their verdict for the defendant. Thus ended the boasted threats of the plaintiff, the liberal and elegant production of his attorney, termed a brief, and the spirited address of Counsellor Gurney!!! Instead of a verdict for two thousand pounds, the plaintiff has to pay his own and the defendant's costs, amounting to about two hundred pounds!!

We determined to defend our critical remarks on the nostrum, in a manner becoming members of a liberal profession. That the question as to the legality of quackery, or the protection of it by the Legislature, might be properly brought before the Court, we desired Mr. Phillips to subpoena two physicians of eminence, to whom we were not personally known, to justify our plea; and an able chemist, to whom we were also unknown, to speak of our analysis, and the scientific or chemical character of the surgeon's specification. We named Dr. Powell, because he has frequently given his evidence in the Court of King's Bench, on medical subjects, and always as a man of science and independence. We gave the name of Dr. Paris, because he had noticed the composition of Mr. Rymer's Cardiac Tincture in a late publication. We mentioned the name of Mr. Hume of Long Acre, because we considered him to be the first pharmaceutical chemist in this country, and a man of the strictest sense of honour.

Such mode of proceeding would not answer the purpose of the plaintiff and his attorney.

Their object was clearly to get a verdict, honestly if they could, but to get it was their determination. The brief was accordingly replete with scurrility and falsehood, and to give it every possible effect, they fixed on Mr. Gurney, who certainly did them justice, in supporting the independence, if not the respectability of the bar, and in extra-exertion to make the " worse appear the better cause." This "learned gentleman" boldly asserted, on the authority of his brief, in his peculiar delicate and elegant style of expression, that Dr. Reece was interested in running down Mr. Rymer's Cardiac Tincture; he had a medical hall, where a substitute might be obtained; and that he attacked the professional characters of the first medical men, from a similar honourable motive. Now had Dr. Reece been actuated by such a wish, in giving an analysis of Mr. Rymer's medicine, and in pointing out the mischief, that so powerful a stimulus is capable of producing in different stages of the diseases for which it is recommended, and in every stage of them, under certain circumstances, with the view of substituting another medicine for it, or of injuring the professional character of Mr. Rymer to benefit himself, why did not the attorney enable his counsel to substantiate those serious charges? Such evidence would, indeed, have entitled Mr. Rymer to a verdict, and render us deserving of the severest reprehension. The non-production of such proof is direct evidence of their not having been able to procure it, and the base insinuation proved, as a learned counsel observed, the badness of their cause. Indeed, how could such a cause be otherwise supported? The article on Surgeon Rymer's Cardiac Tincture, which his legal adviser,