l pharmacopoeias, and tortured us from the
time "when our wine and our oil increased"--Gout, that colchicum would
vainly attempt to baffle, that no nepenthe soothes, no opium can send to
sleep--Gout, that makes as light of the medical practitioner as of his
patient; that murdered _Musgrave_, and seized her very own historian by
the hip[9]--this, our most formidable foe, is to be conquered at Vichy!
Here, in a brief time, the iron gyves of _Podagra_ are struck _off_, and
_Cheiragra's manacles_ are unbound; enabling old friends, who had
hitherto shaken their _heads_ in despondency, once more to shake
_hands_.

But Vichy, be it understood, neither cures, nor undertakes to cure,
every body; her waters have nothing to do with your head, your heart, or
your lungs; their empire begins and ends below the _diaphragm_; it is
here, and here alone, that her mild control quells dangerous internal
commotions, establishes quiet in irritated organs, and restores health
on the firm basis of _constitutional principles_. The real _doctors_ at
Vichy are the _waters_; and much is it to be regretted that they should
not find that co-operation and assistance in those who administer them,
which Hippocrates declares of such paramount importance in the
management of all disease; for here (alas! for the inconsistency of man)
the two physicians _prescribed_ to us by the government, while they
gravely tell their patients that no good can happen to such as will
think, fret, or excite themselves, while they formally interdict all
_sour_ things at table, (shuddering at a cornichon if they detect one on
the plate of a rebellious water-drinker, and denouncing honest
fruiterers as poisoners,) yet foment sour discord, and keep their
patients in perpetual hot water, alike _in the bath_ and _out of the
bath_; more tender in their regard for _another_ generation, they
recommend all nurses to undergo a slight course of the springs to _keep
their milk_ from turning sour, yet will curdle the _milk of human
kindness_ in our lacteals by instilling therein the sour asperity which
they entertain towards each other, and which, notwithstanding the
efforts of the ladies to keep peace between them, by christening one
their "_beau medecin_," and the other their "_bon medecin_," has arrived
at such a pitch that they refuse to speak French, or issue one "_fiat_"
in common.[10]

A remarkable fact connected with the natural history of the Vichy waters
is the following:--W