MEDICAL QUACKS AND QUACKERIES. 153 



inches long, blunt at one end and pointed at the other." They (so he 

 affirmed) " cured rheumatism, local pains, inflammation, and even tumors, 

 by drawing them over the affected parts for a few minutes." Dr. Per- 

 kins patented his discovery, and soon found numerous adherents, many 

 of them being men of wealth and position. His son, Benjamin Doug- 

 lass Perkins, crossed the Atlantic with the tractors, and in 1798 they 

 were employed in the Royal Hospital in Copenhagen. In London 

 their reputation was quickly established, and they soon became the 

 fashion. The Royal Society accepted Perkins's tractors and book, and 

 passed a vote of thanks to him ; by 1804 a " Perkinean Institution " 

 had been founded, which published transactions and held annual din- 

 ners. Lord Rivers was the first president, Governor Franklin vice- 

 president, and Lord Henneker, a fellow of the Royal Society, one of 

 the members. All this time Douglass Perkins was coining money 

 by selling tractors at five guineas each, which cost about ninepence. 

 A hospital was built, where the only treatment was " tractoration." 

 Persons in the highest positions willingly gave testimonials, telling 

 of the marvelous cures wrought on themselves and their friends by 

 these wonderful tractors. The bishops and clergymen on both sides of 

 the Atlantic were most eager to thrust forward evidence on this medical 

 topic ; whole pages of panegyric were contributed by them. One writes, 

 " I have used the tractors with success in several other cases in my own 

 family, and, although like Naaman, the Syrian, I can not tell why the 

 waters of Jordan should be better than Abana and Pharpar, rivers of 

 Damascus, yet since experience has proved them so no reasoning can 

 change the opinion " (" Currents and Counter-Currents," p. 85). 



Many ministers of religion were furnished with tractors gratui- 

 tously, and Dr. Holmes remarks that one of the risks of infancy he 

 had to encounter was Perkins's tractors. The medical profession was 

 ever hostile to the new revelation, and their hostility by many was 

 attributed to jealousy and self-interest. The Connecticut Medical 

 Society, in 1797, expelled Dr. Perkins, for violating their regulations 

 against nostrums and secret remedies. The bubble was burst by Dr. 

 Haygarth, of Bath, who experimented on patients with bogus tractors 

 made of wood : he was quite as successful with them as with the five- 

 guinea ones ! These experiments did not immediately destroy the be- 

 lief of the real Perkinistic enthusiasts, because, as Froude says, " be- 

 lief in the marvelous does not rise from evidence, and will not yield 

 to it." After a time, however, Perkinism passed away so quietly that 

 the date of its death is unrecorded. Lord Byron, in his "English 

 Bards and Scotch Reviewers," refers to these celebrated Tractors :* 



* " Thus saith the Preacher, ' Naught beneath the sun 

 Is new,' yet still from change to change we run ; 

 What varied wonders tempt us as they pass ! 

 The cow-pox, Tractors, galvanism, gas, 

 In turns appear to make the vulgar stare, 

 Till the swoll'n bubble bursts and all is air ! " 



