TWO LETTERS

ΤΟ

DR. HASTINGS, OF WORCESTER,

M.D. AND F. G. S.

SECRETARY TO THE PROVINCIAL MEDICAL AND SURGICAL

ASSOCIATION,

ON THE

RESULTS OF THE WATER-CURE

AT MALVERN,

&c. &c. &c.

BY JAMES WILSON, M.D.

PHYSICIAN TO HIS SERENE HIGHNESS PRINCE NASSAU, MEMBER OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF SURGEONS OF LONDON, LATE FELLOW OF THE ROYAL MEDICAL AND CHIRURGICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON, &c. &c. &c. AUTHOR OF THE "WATER CURE," AND OF A PRACTICAL TREATISE ON THE CURATIVE EFFECTS OF VAPOUR APPLIED LOCALLY."

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"One tale is good until another's told."-OLD ADAGE.

"Nothing extenuate nor set down aught in malice."-SHAKSPEARE.

1842.

LETTER I.

LEARNED DOCTOR,

I make no apology for intruding myself upon you in the form of a published letter: first, because I have a strong suspicion that you will not be displeased at being noticed at all: and next, because, as you have thought proper to assail the Water Cure, and fall foul of me in a paper addressed, in the first instance, to the very small number of the subscribers to the "Provincial Medical Journal,"* and have subsequently eked

*The history of this journal is pretty nearly as follows. Originally established by the ex-sub-editor of the "Lancet,” about the period of the formation of the Provincial Medical Association, the latter body found in it a ready organ for the propagation of its meetings and opinions. But as the purchase of its pages was an undertaking beyond the courage of the secretary of the Association, he imagined an ingenious and economical plan for doing it at the expense of his con

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LIBELLOUS MISREPRESENTATIONS.

out the list of your readers by a gratuitous distribution of the same, it is but fair that I should have the right of such reply as my poor wits and fully occupied time can afford.

Impressed with a sense of my infinite smallness, when contrasted with the " Physician to the Worcester Infirmary, and Secretary to the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association," I cannot in my reply do better than follow his example in part of the taste and style that adorn his attack. Accordingly I shall, in the succeeding pages, altogether suppress your prænomen and nomen, and address you by the various professional titles in which you rejoice, and which, in initials and full-drawn words, make so formidable an appearance to the "John Bull" you so elegantly compliment on his simplicity.

And first it behoves me, whom you have

frères. He proposed to the editor and proprietor-Dr. Hennis Green, a gentleman of learning and integrity—that each member should pay one penny per week for his copy of the Journal, leaving the proprietor to get as much more circulation as he could. By this means the Association is made to pay for a journal which the said secretary uses, at his will, to any purposes that may appear advantageous to himself, giving him, as it does, the power of circulating libellous misrepresentations, at the small price of one penny per number!!

HERO OF THE DRUG SYSTEM.

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dubbed" the water-doctor," to return the politeness by granting you licence to bear the title of

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Drug-doctor," in addition to those already inflicted upon you. And as, for my part, I feel especially honoured by the distinctive epithet you have bestowed on me, bearing evidence, as it does, to my knowledge and practice of the only philosophical, harmless, and effectual system of medical treatment yet promulgated, I have every right to presume that you will listen with corresponding

amenity to the epithet "drug-doctor," expressive as it is of your practice in pills, plasters, and potions, blistering and bleeding, purging and prescribing. Further, as, by the grace of your pen, I am written down" the hero of the water-cure," another proud title to me,-common justice obliges me to look to you as the "hero of the drug system.' In this particular, you must admire my candour: for, whereas I come into the field with no offensive means save the water that gushes from these beautiful and healthful hills, you are likely to prove the more formidable "hero" of the two, armed as you are with all the appliances-the aforesaid pills, plasters, &c,-of your truly destructive art. Here, alas! the reciprocity must