exhausted with these arrangements. He
understood his business perfectly, and felt that, in
order to make his pill go down, it was necessary
to secure the patronage of a peer of the
realm. With this view he entered into
negotiations with a poor nobleman residing abroad.
The transaction was a long time pending, but
at length it was signed and sealed between
Mr. Smith and the Earl of Rottenborough,
that his lordship should, for and in consideration
of the sum of six hundred per annum, to
be paid to him, the Earl of Rottenborough,
by the said Mr. Smith, consent to be cured
in public advertisements, by means of Mr.
Smith's Omnipotent Pill, of any disease of
which the said Mr. Smith might choose to
call upon him, the Earl aforesaid, to testify
he had been cured. Under these auspices
Mr. Smith's Pills had thrived exceedingly,
but it was not till Mr. Smith conferred upon
himself a diploma, and inducted himself into
the chair in a college which he endowed, for
that single purpose, somewhere, that the
Universal Pill was found in every respectable
house in the three kingdoms, as the special and
particular pill of Professor Smith, M.D., without
whose signature all others were spurious.

Poor Prattles! how could he, who had not
twenty pounds in the world, hope to compete
with the rich Professor Smith. When he
recounted the advantages which his rival
possessed, and reflected upon his own moneyless
condition, he was ready to give up his
idea in despair. At this crisis of his fate his
wife, one day in purest jest, told him that care
would soon make him look as old as Methusaleh.
This simple remark, he affectingly
tells at the present time, decided him. He
would have a Methusaleh Pill! His wife
tried hard to dissuade him from embarking
in so expensive a speculation, but he was deaf
to her pleading. He wrote forthwith to his
cousin, who was a chemist at Bath, and asked
him to mix him a harmless pill. " Let the
properties it contains neutralise one another."
This was the simple direction. A bribe of a
third share in the speculation decided his
cousin, the chemist, to set to work
immediately. The next step was to frame a very
learned history of the pill—to trace its descent
from Methusaleh to Prattles. With this
object, Prattles consulted a battered old
schoolmaster of his acquaintance, whose scraps
of ancient lore sufficed for the printer's
purpose. In a few hours a very interesting story,
narrating the history of the receipt, was
fabricated and ready for the press. It ran as
follows:—

"It is well known to most people that the
venerable Methusaleh lived to the good old
age of NINE HUNDRED AND SIXTY
NINE YEARS. The secret of so long a life
has for ages remained an IMPENETRABLE
MYSTERY. In these degenerate days men
seldom live to gaze upon their grandchildren;
but in the days of Methusaleh matters were
very different. Men lived for centuries.
What potent power—what subtle elixir—
held body and soul together for so long a
period? ' That is the question.' About two
years ago two gentlemen were travelling in
THE ARID DESERTS OF ASIA MINOR.
They fell in, one evening, with an encampment
of Arabs. They were most hospitably
received by the Mussulmen. The first
peculiarity they remarked among the Arabs was
that there were several men in the encampment
who, though they looked very old, were
nevertheless active in their gait and lively in
conversation. Our travellers entered into
conversation with one of these hoary sons of the
desert; the old man was very communicative.

"' I was in your country many years ago,
when Charles the Second was King. I played
tricks before him: he was a jovial fellow.
Ah! I was young then.' And the old man
heaved a deep sigh. The travellers, it may
well be imagined, were surprised; and, at
first, somewhat incredulous.

"' There is a man—but he is very old now—
who fought in Palestine when one of your
king's sons helped in a foolish war—I think
you Christians called it the Holy War.' The
old man pointed to a figure crouched to the
earth. It was that of a very old man, whose
hair was white as silver. ' That man,'
continued the Arab, who was addressing the
travellers, 'is upwards of six hundred years
old!'

"' Incredible! ' our travellers exclaimed.

"' Hush! ' the old Arab continued; ' you
of the degenerate West know nothing of this
matter. The secret remains with us—to you
it is unknown—an undiscovered mystery.
Have you ever heard of Methusaleh? '

"The travellers replied in the affirmative.

"' Do you know by what secret he prolonged
his life to the ripe old age of nine hundred
and sixty nine-years? '

"The travellers confessed their profound
ignorance. Forthwith the old Arab fumbled,
with his ebon hands, about the folds of his
turban, and presently drew therefrom a
tattered piece of parchment, so dirty, besmeared
with grease, and discoloured by age, that the
Arabic characters written upon it could be
deciphered only by the most practised Arabic
scholar. One of the travellers happened to
be a proficient in Arabic. He begged the old
man to allow him to peruse the precious
document. To this the wily Arab consented, on
the conditions that it should be read in his
own hands, and that he should receive a large
sum of money for allowing the travellers to
transcribe its contents. These preliminaries
having been arranged, the party entered the
nearest tent, and the travellers became
possessed of the invaluable life-preserver. On
their return to England the travellers entered
into a negotiation with the present proprietor
of the recipe, who offers his

             METHUSALEH PILLS

to the British public at thirteenpence-half-