curers" have, perhaps, of all others, been the
most notorious. The formidable nature of
cancer, its comparative frequency in both
sexes, arid the belief that it is incurable
by known methods of treatment, have been
among the reasons why this class of
empirics should attract a large share of public
attention. Added to these is the natural
dread of the surgeon's knife, and the bold
assertions of the pretender that he possesses the
secret, as yet unrevealed to the world, by which
recovery may be effected painlessly and certainly
without having recourse to the dreaded operation.
On the part of the public, the love of novelty,
the benevolent wish to further anything which
promises so great a boon as the relief of pain or
the saving of life, leads indirectly to the
countenancing of the empiric and to the furthering
of his selfish ends. A certain proportion of
supposed cures are effected by the removal of
benign tumours which ought never to have been
mistaken for cancer, or by the destruction of
the surface of a genuine cancer and the
temporary healing of the skin. Mr. Spencer
Wells, in a little work on Cancer Cures and
Cancer Curers, has shown that their remedies
mainly consist of compounds of mercury, arsenic,
or zinc, disguised by admixture with some other
ingredients, and that the pain caused by these
caustics is tenfold more severe and more
protracted than the pain of excision by the knife.
Not one of these pretenders whose secret has
transpired, or who has had a fair trial under
competent supervision, has contributed anything
to the advantage of sufferers from cancer;
not one has suggested anything new, while
the mischief they have done has been
incalculable. In the beginning of the last century a
person named Plunkett practised as a cancer
curer in London. He had no knowledge of
surgery in general, and, of course, must have
been guided by intuition to his diagnosis.
He prescribed from the traditionary directions of
his namesake, formerly an empiric in Ireland,
who left the receipt for his medicine, with
directions for its use, to Steeven's Hospital.
Plunkett's nostrum was a form of caustic which
professed not only to destroy the tumour, but to
penetrate like a separate intelligence into every
direction where the marked tissue was deposited
and to uproot it utterly. The notion of cancer
possessing roots has probably arisen from the
supposed resemblance it has to a crab holding
its prey: though truly the existence of the so-
called roots is an entire misapprehension.
Plunkett's secret was purchased by Richard
Grey in 1754, and kept secret by him until a
controversy took place about it, in which
Gataker, one of the surgeons to the king, took
an active part. Its owner then published the
secret in Lloyd's Evening Post, for March 5th,
1760, as follows: "Crow's-foot, which grows
on low ground, one handful; dog-fennel, three
sprigs, the two to be well pounded; crude
brimstone, three thimblefuls; white arsenic,
the same quantity. All incorporated well in a
mortar, then made into small balls the size of
nutmegs and dried in the sun." It is curious
to observe that this receipt is really a type of most
of the nostrums which have been highly vaunted
in recent times for the cure of the same disorder.
Yet even Plunkett had no claim to originality, for
the exhaustive effects of arsenic, which was the
active ingredient in this nostrum, was well
known to the Greek and Roman physicians, and
had been used for centuries in the removal of
cancerous diseases. Mr. Justamond, who was
surgeon to the Westminster Hospital at the
time, gave a full and fair trial to Plunkett's and
Grey's caustics, and came to the conclusion that
the advantages gained did not compensate for
the risk incurred. Lord Bolingbroke was killed
by a man who pretended to cure him of cancer
in the face, and the remedy employed was
Plunkett's paste. Similar fatal results have followed
the use of other quack nostrums used for the
same purpose. Not long ago a German empiric
agreed to come to this country from somewhere
on the Rhine, to heal a lady affected with cancer.
The fee was to be three hundred guineas. The
quack's first application was made on the
Monday, and on Tuesday it had destroyed the
coats of a large artery, and the patient bled to
death in a few minutes. In another case, a
physician was called to see a lady who was said to
have fainted. On his arrival, he found a cancer
curer in attendance, totally unconscious of the true
position of affairs; he had only just assured the
husband, indeed, that the wife was going on well,
and would soon be cured. The patient was dead!

Within the last few weeks the most
unscrupulous, perhaps, of all the cancer curers has
been arraigned before the Tribunal of Correctional
Police in France, and punished by
imprisonment and fine. A native of Surinam, named
Vriès, assumed the name of the "Docteur Noir,"
and pretending that he had a diploma from the
faculty at Leyden, established himself in Paris
as a cancer curer and universal medical genius.
He gave out that he had discovered in the tropical
regions an infallible antidote which he called the
"quinquina of cancer," and also other specifics for
divers diseases. Prospectuses were profusely
distributed, announcing that the "black doctor"
had received supernatural relations confirmatory
of the value of his treatment, and numbers of
poor sufferers were induced to apply. Immense
sums were exacted previous to the treatment
being commenced, and, however far the disease
had progressed, the patients were invariably
assured that cure was certain. An ample trial
was afforded to the remedies in the hospital La
Charité, the treatment there being conducted
by the black doctor himself, and after the most
deliberate investigation, the scheme was
pronounced on all hands a failure.

At his trial for swindling, it appeared that, in
1834, he had left his country, and had visited
Holland, America, and England, to introduce
foreign medicines. In England he had
endeavoured to set up a new religion, had preached
against the idolatry of Rome, and had
proclaimed that he feared neither the poniards of
the Jesuits, nor the thunders of the Vatican.