A^StJmm'}        American  Medical  Association.  377 
olis,"  who  appeared  to  have  formed  a  syndicate  for  the  promotion 
of  clinical  therapeutics,  but  eventually  had  to  share  their  position 
with  previously  unknown  "  coming  lights  "  of  the  profession,  from 
such  great  centers  of  medical  lore  as  Arkadelphia,  Ark.,  Shreveport, 
La.,  and  Coffeyville,  Kan.  As  this  kind  of  proprietary-medicine 
business  grew  because  of  the  success  made  by  this  pioneer,  medical 
journals  sprang  up  at  nearly  every  crossroads  and  with  them  devel- 
oped a  peculiar  profession — the  paid-for-article  doctor.  The  mem- 
bers of  this  profession  were  chiefly  distinguished  by  the  character- 
istic that  their  names  were  unknown  to  medical  literature  until 
suddenly  they  burst  in  all  their  own  effulgent  glory  in  some  com- 
munication to  the  "  Medical  Gold  Brick,"  telling  the  credulous  and 
unsuspecting  doctor  how  to  treat  his  patient  by  doping  him  with 
*l  Dopine,"  by  sweating  him  with  "  Sweatine,"  by  nerving  him  with 
"  Nervine,"  and  don't  forget  it — eliminate  his  uric  acid  with  "  Uri- 
cadine."  He  had  solved  the  great  problem.  He  had  reduced  the 
practice  of  medicine  to  a  science — to  an  exact  science.  No  groping 
in  the  dark — no  experimentation  ;  no  chance  of  failure — everything 
cock-sure.    If  not  satisfied,  money  back. 
Pardon  this  last  lapsus.  This  never  appears  in  the  doctor's 
learned  communication,  but  in  the  advertising  pages  where  the 
especial  therapeutic,  secernent  and  synergistic  actions  of  the  various 
wonderful  discoveries  are  proclaimed. 
Many  of  these  prolific  contributors  have  been  gathered  to  their 
fathers,  but  they  are  by  no  means  extinct  and  they  exist  in  places 
where  they  would  be  least  expected, — even  in  medical  colleges. 
It  is  some  satisfaction  to  know  that  their  fame  will  not  be  lost ;  that 
they  have  all  been  carefully  listed  and  tabulated  and  sometime  in 
the  near  future  posterity  will  know,  how  numerous  were  the 
species  of  Iscariots  who  sold  their  birthrights  in  the  most  noble 
profession  for  a  mess  of  pottage. 
POSING  AS  AUTHORITY. 
The  business  of  publishing  a  medical  journal  by  a  doctor,  or  a 
coterie  of  doctors,  for  the  express  purpose  of  "  working  "  their  col- 
leagues with  a  line  of  proprietary  medicines,  became  so  common 
that  one  or  more  such  journals  were  started  often  in  places  devoid 
of  the  least  reason  for  the  existence  of  such  journals,  except  the 
editor's  ambition  and  desire  to  make  some  money  off  his  readers, 
