r
smallpox, announced in 1711 that he would sell "the true Lockyers
Pills."[29] This was an unpatented remedy first concocted half a
century earlier by a "licensed physitian" in London. The next year
Boylston repeated this appeal,[30] and in the same advertisement listed
other wares of the same type. He had two varieties, Golden and Plain,
of the Spirit of Scurvy-Grass; he had "The Bitter Stomach Drops," worm
potions for children; and a wonderful multipurpose nostrum, "the Royal
Honey Water, an Excellent Perfume, good against Deafness, and to Make
Hair grow...." The antecedents of this regal liquid are unknown.
Boylston also announced for sale "The Best [Daffy's] Elixir Salutis in
Bottles, or by the Ounce." This is a provocative listing. It may mean
merely that the apothecary would break a bottle to sell a dose of the
Elixir, which was often the custom. But it also may suggest that
Boylston was making the Elixir himself, or was having it prepared by a
journeyman. This latter interpretation would place Boylston well at the
head of a long parade of American imitators of the old English patent
medicines.

[29] _Ibid._, March 12, 1711.

[30] _Ibid._, March 24, 1712.

Other such shipments of the packaged English remedies may have come to
New England on the latest ships from London during the next several
decades, but they got scant play in the advertising columns of the
small 4-page _Boston News-Letter_. Another reference to "Doctor Anthony
Daffey's Original Elixer Salutis" occurs in 1720.[31] Ten years later,
Stoughton's Drops were announced for sale "by Public Vendue," along
with feather beds, looking glasses, and leather breeches.[32] Nearly a
decade more was to pass before Bateman's Pectoral Drops showed up in
the midst of another general list, including cheese, and shoes, and
stays.[33] Not until 1748 did an advertisement appear in which several
of the old English nostrums rubbed shoulders with each other.[34] Then
Silvester Gardiner, at the Sign of the Unicorn and Mortar, asserted
that "by appointment of the Patentee" he was enabled to sell "Genuine
British Oyl, _Bateman's_ Pectoral Drops, and _Hooper's_ Female Pills,
and the True _Lockyer's_ Pills."

[31] _Ibid._, November 14, 1720.

[32] _Ibid._, March 12, 1730.

[33] _Ibid._, January 4, 1739.

[34] _Ibid._, November 14, 1748.

Although nearly a century old, Anderson's Scots Pills were not cited
for sale in the pages of