386 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
[August, 
In June last, we gave, from circulars tliat had been 
sent us, some account of a very useless, if not pernic¬ 
ious book, which one Amzi L. Schofield, in Connecticut, 
was engaged in selling. Amzi is disappointed. While 
we showed very plainly what a useless, not to say vile, 
book he was engaged in selling, we did not give his 
post office address. We do not advertise wares of the 
kind that Amzi deals in, and the sending of the book 
will not induce us to give “ my full address, so that 
whoever may wish to know,” etc. Amzi, we are not in 
that line of advertising. You have sent us a copy of the 
“magic wand and medical guide." 
While the circulars which came to us promise a great 
deal, the book itself is nothing more or less than a ten¬ 
der to a New York quack medicine shop of the meanest 
kind, Amzi, wo advise you to go into some more re¬ 
spectable business than that of selling such trash as the 
“Magic Wand and Medical Guide.” 
About Cheap Organs. 
A concern in Massachusetts has for some time been 
sending out circulars, which, with much circumlocution 
of certificates and big red seal, set forth the fact that 
for eleven dollars ($11) and twenty-five names, they will 
send an organ, in fact, “ one of our full-size Parlor 
Cabinet Organs.” We have not given the matter much 
attention, feeling, perhaps, that one who expected to 
get an organ of any value for eleven dollars, did not 
need much sympathy if the instrument should turn 
out worthless. Even allowing the twenty-five names to 
be worth a dollar each (a high price, as such things go), 
what kind of a “Parlor Organ’’could one expect for 
thirty-six dollars? This eleven dollars and “twenty- 
five names” organ business seemed to bo altogether 
too absurd on the face of it, to require special notice. 
Letters of inquiry continue to come, and we can only 
reply, that we have no reason to believe that the parties 
will not send eleven dollars’ worth of organ. Some 
persons may have a use for an instrument of this value, 
but we can not conceive what for. Those familiar with 
the cost of cabinet work, will see at onco that eleven 
dollars will not go very far towards providing a decent 
case, let alone the working parts of an organ. A friend 
Id Canada writes us that one of his neighbors, a clergy¬ 
man, procured one of these organs. He says that the 
case was “ daubed here and there with paint,” and that 
the keys were “papered.” Yes, but what could you 
expect of a “ cabinet organ ” for eleven dollars ? 
Life Insurance.-“ Mo Medical Ex¬ 
amination ICequired.” 
We look upon Life Insurance as a most beneficent in¬ 
stitution. Its utility is shown not only by the great 
number of persons of moderate income, who make a 
provision for their families, but men of wealth, those 
who are careful in making investments, are known to 
insure their lives for large amounts. There are several 
Life Insurance offices, among others the Mutual Life In¬ 
surance Co. of N. Y., and the New York Life Ins. Co., 
as safe as any human institution can be, and who offer 
those who insure every advantage that long experience, 
abundant capital, and careful management can afford. 
Of course. Life Insurance, properly conducted, has been 
very profitable to all concerned, and this fact has been 
taken advantage of by speculators to set on foot schemes, 
which, to say the least, were doubtful. Only a year or 
two ago, a device to gamble on the insured lives of vari¬ 
ous aged persons, had attained to such proportions in a 
neighboring State, that it came to the notice of the 
courts and was properly suppressed. Now we have the 
circulars of a concern in Baltimore, of which we know 
nothing beyond what they state themselves. When&Life 
Insurance Company in Baltimore, or elsewhere, says in 
a confidential circular: 
“We offer better inducements to make money than any 
other Company.” Our advice is, to look into the merits 
of some “other company,” that does not make such 
claims. When a company announces that “No Medical 
Examination ” is required, we should prefer to invest in 
a company, where a strict examination was required of 
each applicant. Those who wish to insure, can find that 
there are companies of the highest character, which do 
not publish statements like these. 
Lotteries and their Ways. 
The Lottery, as managed of late, is a most stupendous 
fraud. Only such prizes are announced as will answer 
for advertising purposes. That the Legislatures of 
nearly all States should prohibit lotteries by law, is not 
so much to be wondered at as that one or two States 
should still continue to countenance one of the worst of 
modern swindles. That most beneficent law, which 
prevents the use of the mails for fraudulent purposes, 
has saved to the people of this country untold millions, 
and has been, next to the exposures in these columns, 
the greatest check upon fraudulent schemes of all kinds. 
Deprived of the use of the mails, lotteries have been 
driven out of the country. 
LOTTERIES IN CANADA AND EUROPE 
are now flooding the country, especially the Western 
portion, with their circulars. There appears to be a 
weak place in our generally excellent postal arrange¬ 
ments, which allows swindlers from over the border to 
use the mails, while home scoundrels are shut out. 
THE KENTUCKY LOTTERY CHAPS 
• 
are not dead yet. They send out circulars which show 
that while they may not be in the Lottery business, they 
still run a “Distribution Company.” There is a great 
display of red and blue ink, and pictures to show how. 
at their “Magnificent Distribution”—it is not a “lot¬ 
tery,” even in Kentucky—one can, by investing two 
dollars, get a prize of thirty thousand dollars. We are in¬ 
formed that the “ chances are greater by forming clubs.” 
THAT NEW BRUNSWICK AFFAIR 
is not so much of a Lottery as it was. This time it is a 
“ Grand Single Number Drawing,” also a “ Cash Distri¬ 
bution.” The terms of “tickets to agents” may be 
very good for “ agents,” but how about the poor fellows 
who are not “agents,” and have no place “on the in¬ 
side track ” ? Stimpson (with a P) “ refers with pride 
to the entire community.” Go it, Stimpson, while you 
can, but we have no doubt that our Postmaster General 
will find a way to keep your miserable trash out of the 
mails. Your circulars and things seem to go largely to 
the Western States. The farmers thereabouts wilt stand 
a share of home nonsense, but when Canadians send 
their stuff, they don’t like it, and the terms in which 
they express themselves about you and your swindle 
would afford you, Stimpson, some refreshing, if not 
consoling, reading. 
EUROPEAN SWINDLERS, 
and their agents, are not to be tolerated. Mr. D. Mayer, 
in New York City, we must say to you, as they say down 
South, “ we have no use for you.” We don’t care how 
“ Royal ” your scheme may be, or whatever your “ Gov¬ 
ernment” may have to do with it. Every one of tho 
“ schemes ’’ you send out, Mayer, is in violation of the 
laws of the country, which tolerates, but does not want 
you. Mayer, our Ohio farmers don’t need any such 
literature as you send them. If they are foolish enough 
to invest in a lottery, it will not be in yours. Mayer, you 
had better go home. Wo wonder if D. Mayer has any¬ 
thing to do with 
MR. MARTIN MEYER, JR., OF HAMBURG, GERMANY, 
for whom we have a word of caution. You had better 
call on the American Consul at your port, and learn what 
are the postal laws of the United States. You are flood¬ 
ing some of our Western States with your Lottery Cir¬ 
culars. Every one you send, is in direct violation of the 
laws of this country. Every answer sent to you can be, 
and no doubt soon will be, stopped before it reaches the 
ocean steamer. The laws have so far interfered with the 
Lottery in this country, that some managers have taken 
refuge in New Brunswick and other parts of the Domin¬ 
ion. We shall soon find a way to put a stop to these, as 
well as to your invasions from the other side of the 
ocean. We do not wonder, that a respectable mechanic 
in an Ohio city is indignant at receiving one of your 
circulars, tempting him to join your gambling scheme. 
If the 
“LOTTERY OF THE FREE CITY OF HAMBURG” 
was “ founded more than a hundred years ago,”—it is 
time that it stopped—at any rate, we want none of it 
here, even if your tickets do have “ the official coat of 
arms.” By the way, there is not only a great exposure 
of “arms,” but of other parts of the “ human form di¬ 
vine ” on your superfluous “ promissory note.” Meyer, 
we have no use for you; confine your circulars to the 
other side of the broad ocean. 
DECISION IN THE LOUISIANA LOTTERY CASE. 
Postmaster General Gresham has handed in his decis¬ 
ion regarding the use of the mails by the Louisiana 
Lottery Co. He upholds the first order, issued by Post¬ 
master General Key, in 1879, commanding the return of all 
money orders and registered letters to the parties send¬ 
ing them to this company. This decision puts a quietus 
on the Louisiana Lottery Company for the next three 
years, as it will take that time to bring the case up on 
appeal. By official report of the Post Office Department, 
it has been shown that the stealings in transmissions by 
the mails have amounted to $100,000 annually. 
Medical Matters, 
occupy a large share of our correspondence. When we 
receive such a letter as this from “ H. H.,” Short Creek, 
Ohio,we sometimes wonder,if our exposures do any good. 
“H. H.” writes us asking to “caution our readers to 
send no money to the Rev. Joseph T. Inmann.N. Y. City,” 
and indulges in some remarks not very complimentary to 
the Rev. Joe. If there is a miserable fraud, that we have 
shown up from time to time for the last twenty years, it 
is this same “ Rev. Jos. T. Inmann,” and requests to 
show him up, can only come from new readers of the 
American Agriculturist. Still, so long as journals, re¬ 
garded as respectable, will publish the advertisement of 
this miserable Inmann fraud, we shall no doubt be obliged 
to warn our readers against it in years to come. Our 
correspondent asks us “ if we cannot induce publishers 
to drop this advertisement.” We have done all that is 
possible in exposing, again and again, its fraudulent 
character. Subscribers to these journals, if they stop 
taking them, and give their reason for so doing, can exer¬ 
cise an influence that will be felt. 
A CONSUMPTION CURE. 
A correspondent in Chesterville, Ont., sends us the 
circulars of a New York quack, and asks us to “inquire 
if he is a fraud or a regular practitioner.” It is not 
necessary to go beyond the circulars sent out by this man 
Slocum, to learn that he is a quack of a higher grade than 
the average. He asks $10 for his stuff, while most others 
are lower priced. Let them all alone. 
THE LITERATURE OF QUACKERY, 
affords a study that would be amusing; were it not for 
the consideration that many are duped by, and suffer on 
account of it. One who starts a quack medicine, fixes 
upon some disease of an obscure class; he may call the 
trouble scrofula, catarrh, consumption, nervous debility, 
or seminal weakness. Either of these allow enough of 
general symptoms to be given to make those who read 
their pamphlets to discover that they are very ill. Ner¬ 
vous or imaginative persons, find their symptoms ex¬ 
actly described, they send for the medicine—usually some 
simple tonic, and think themselves relieved by taking it. 
The relief is quite as often as otherwise a mental one. 
The mere fact, that a nervous, anxious person, has to 
take a dose at certain stated hours, it may be accompanied 
with somo restrictions as to diet, occupies and amuses 
him. A large share of the quack medicines of the present 
day relate to a matter not easily treated of in a journal 
like ours—and yet it is one we can not ignore. There is 
nothing concerning which so little is known, and upon 
which fears are so readily excited, as that of seminal 
weakness. A large share of the quackery of the day is 
founded upon this fact, and there is usually some prom¬ 
inent nostrum offered for this trouble. Just nowit is 
THE MAR8TON BOLUS. 
A very neat pamphlet is being widely distributed, call¬ 
ing itself a “ Scientific Treatise.” It is the old story 
over again. Any partly ill and nervous person can, by 
reading its pages, find symptoms detailed which meet 
his case, and he soon comes to the conclusion, which is 
the whole object of the pamphlet, that his only hope is 
in using Marston’s nostrum. To offset which, we say, 
Don’t. It has been in our way to keep the run of this 
kind of medical literature for the past forty years. 
There has been no period during all that time in which 
there has not been some sure cure for diseases of this 
kind. Such troubles are largely mental, and the advice 
of an intelligent physician, with regard to mode of life, 
would be far more useful than all the medicines of any 
unknown quack. This Marston pamphlet is a new one, 
yet it has been, to judge from our correspondence, in¬ 
dustriously circulated. It is calculated to alarm the 
nervous, and to do mischief. Those who, upon reading 
it, think they are in trouble, do not need the “ Com¬ 
pany’s ” boluses or any other stuff; they only need the 
friendly counsel of an intelligent medical man. 
“wonderful miracle cures.” 
There was a chap in Brooklyn, not long ago, who 
pretended to cure by the laying on of hands. But he has 
a rival in one Dr. Clark, in Massachusetts, who says: 
“Soul and Body treated together,” which shows that he 
undertakes quite too much for one poor mortal. Here 
is a large, closely-printed, four-page circular, that is a 
most surprising production for the present century. 
Parts of it seem to us blasphemous ; it is all remarkably 
egotistical. For example, he publishes his own por¬ 
trait, and then prints this saying of some one; “The 
resemblance between the portrait of Dr. Clark and 
Abraham Lincoln, which many persons see, is sugges¬ 
tive,” We have no patience with this style of quackery. 
