Part 23

BAUME DE FIORAVENTI.

This medicine still figures in the French Codex and in other continental Pharmacopœias. It is an alcoholic tincture of canella, cloves, nutmegs, ginger, and other spices, with bay berries, to which are added amber, galbanum, myrrh, aloes, elemi, and other resins, and one-sixth by volume of turpentine. After digestion this mixture is distilled to a yield of about two-thirds of the original bulk. The balm was formerly given in doses of 5 or 6 drops in kidney disorders, but it is now only used externally in rheumatism and for chilblains, and for strengthening the sight. For the last-named purpose the hand is wetted with the balm and held before the eyes.

Fioraventi was a famous Italian quack in the latter half of the seventeenth century. He practised in Naples, Rome, Venice, Milan, and Florence, and was specially honoured in his native city of Bologna, where he was made a Doctor, a Chevalier, and a Count; titles of which he made the utmost use. He published numerous works on medicine, devised various “Nostra,” and pretended to give the exact formulas for these, but they were always so complicated that no doubt the rich clients whose patronage Fioraventi cultivated would prefer to buy the remedies ready compounded. His medical advice though crammed with bombast was generally sensible, but in all cases he recommended one or another of “our” remedies. These included “our Balm Artificiall” (the compound just referred to), “our Electuaria Anglico,” “our Sirrup Solutivo,” “our Lignum Sanctum,” “our Oleum Benedictum,” and so forth. Above all Fioraventi made play with his “Petra Philosophale.” Philosophers had long disputed, he says, whether it was possible to produce a medicine which would cure all diseases. There was no longer any occasion for dispute; the discovery of “our Petra Philosophale” was conclusive. The directions for making this remedy were very complicated, and of course it was essential that they should be followed minutely. Briefly, the process was to take so much “Sal Niter, Roche Allum, and Roman Vitrioll” (I take the names from an old English translation), “add some Sal Gemmæ, and distil. Then mix Mercury, Sope, Quick Lime, and Common Ashes, sublime off the Mercury, and add it to the first distillate. To the mixture add so much steel, iron, and gold, dry the compound to a stone, which ‘keep as a precious Jewell’ in a closed glass vessel.”

Why Fioraventi should have troubled to invent any other remedies after this, or why his patients should have been called upon to buy any others, is not explained.

BAUME TRANQUILLE

was originally made by the Capucin monk, Aignan, whose religious name was Father Tranquille. The Capucins of the Louvre were noted in the seventeenth century for their medical skill, and Father Tranquille was one of them. Twenty herbs were used in compounding this balsam, among them poppy, tobacco, lavender, and rue. These were infused in oil. “The Baume may be made still more effective,” writes Père Rousseau, who was a fellow monk with Father Tranquille, “by adding as many large live frogs as there are pounds of oil. These are to be boiled in the oil until they are almost burnt. Their juice and fat combine with the oil and greatly augment the excellence of the remedy.” Mme. de Sévigné, writing to her daughter, December 15, 1684, says, “I am sending you the most precious treasure I have: my half bottle of Baume Tranquille. I could not send a full bottle; the Capucins have no more.”

BAUME DE VIE.

Baume de Vie, which is represented by Decoct. Aloes Co., B.P., was first sold by a French apothecary named Le Lievre, of the Rue de la Seine, Paris. A second edition of his book recommending it is dated 1760. He describes himself as “le sieur Lelievre apothicaire, distillateur du Roi.” He says of it that it gently evacuates the heterogeneous humours, restores and fortifies the stomach, reanimates the system without causing any fever or other inconvenience, preserves the humid radical (a fluid supposed to be the principle of life and the generator of vigour), makes the blood circulate, absorbs from it all acids and renders them balsamic, and counteracts debility. He also advises its use for horses, cattle, and dogs. Le Lievre’s formula, as given by Cadet de Gassicourt, was as follows:--

Socotrine aloes, treacle, of each 1 oz.; gentian, ½ oz.; rhubarb, 6 drachms; saffron, agaric, zedoary, myrrh, of each 2 drachms; sugar, 4 oz.; proof spirit, 2 lb.

DUTCH DROPS.

Haarlem Oil or Dutch Drops have been made in Haarlem since the year 1672, when they were invented by one Claas Tilly, and they are still manufactured in Haarlem by a person who claims to be a direct descendant of the inventor. The preparation is stated in Paris’s “Pharmacologia” to have as a base the residue left in the still after the redistillation of turpentine; a red, thick, resinous matter, sometimes called balsam of turpentine. But the same author adds that a preparation often sold as Dutch Drops is a mixture of oil of turpentine, tincture of guaiacum, and spirit of nitre, with oils of amber and cloves. Dutch Drops are asked for all over the world and are known to old-fashioned people as “Medicamentum.” In remote places they are kept in the house and a few drops taken occasionally as a preventive of disease.

GODFREY’S CORDIAL.

The following advertisement which is taken from Reed’s Weekly Journal, February 22, 1722, throws light on the origin of the still popular “Godfrey.”

To all retailers and others. The general cordial formerly sold by Mr. Thomas Godfrey, of Hunsdon, in Hertfordshire, deceas’d, is now prepar’d according to a receipt written by his own hand, and by him given to my wife, his relation, is now sold by me Tho. Humphreys of Ware, in the said county, Surgeon, or at John Humphreys, at the Head and Sheers in Jewin Street, near Cripplegate, London. Also may be furnished with Arcanums and Vomits, and will be allowed the same for selling as formerly.

Godfrey’s Cordial was named in the Medicine Stamp Act of 1812, and was no doubt a proprietary medicine at that time. It now appears to be made by anyone who chooses to make it. In Paris’s “Pharmacologia,” (8th edition, 1833) the following receipt which he says was obtained from a “wholesale druggist who makes and sells many hundred dozens a year,” was printed:--

“Infuse 9 oz. of sassafras; 1 oz. each of carraway, coriander, and anise seeds, in 6 pints of water. Simmer down to 4 pints. When cold add 3 oz. of tincture of opium.”

In 1833 the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy adopted the subjoined formula for Godfrey’s Cordial in order to ensure uniformity:--

“Tinct. Opii, 1½ pint; molasses, from the sugar refiners, 16 pints; alcohol, 2 pints; water, 26 pints; carbonate of potash, 2½ oz.; oil of sassafras, 4 drachms.”

EAU DES CARMES.

Eau de Melisse des Carmes, an aromatic spirit, recommended as a cordial for internal administration, and to bathe the temples, was first compounded in the pharmacy of the Barefooted Carmelites, near the Palace of the Luxembourg in the Faubourg St. Germain in 1611. In the course of the century the preparation became a valuable property, and though its composition was kept secret by the monks, formulas innumerable were published. Richelieu, Elizabeth of Bavaria, mother of the Regent during Louis XIV’s minority, and later, Voltaire, “reclaimed” it. Patents authorising the monks to carry on the manufacture and sale were granted by Louis XIV, Louis XV, and Louis XVI, but when the last was applied for in 1780, the College of Pharmacy opposed it, but withdrew their opposition for the consideration of £40 a year which the monks agreed to pay them. In 1791 when the monastic orders were suppressed and their property confiscated, forty-five Carmelites of the Monastery of the Vaugirard formed themselves into a commercial company to manufacture and sell the Eau des Carmes. Their deed of association provided that the property should remain in the hands of the forty-five down to the last survivor. This one was a certain Brother Paradise, who took as a partner a M. Royer and died in 1831 on the premises in the Rue Taranne where the company had been constituted. M. Royer died a few years later, and his widow married a M. Boyer in 1840 who wrote a “Monographie Historique,” which it is believed was edited for him by Alexander Dumas.

The following formula for a preparation resembling the Eau des Carmes was published by Baumé after many experiments, and was adopted by the compilers of the Codex:--

“Balm, in flower, freshly gathered, and freed from the stalks, 2 lbs.; lemon peel, fresh, 4 oz.; coriander seeds, 8 oz.; nutmegs, cloves, cinnamon, each bruised, 2 oz.; angelica roots, dried, 1 oz.; spirit of wine, highly rectified, 10 pints.”

GODDARD’S DROPS.

The original formula for these is given as follows by Dr. William Salmon in his edition of “Bate’s Dispensatory”:--

R. Humane Bones or rather scales, well dryed, break them into bits, and put them into a retort, and join thereto a large Receiver which lute well; and distil first with a gentle Fire, then with a stronger, increasing the fire gradatim; so will you have in the Recipient a Flegm, Spirit, Oyl, and Volatile Salt. Shake the Receiver to loosen the Volatile Salt from the sides, then close your Receiver and set it in the earth to digest for three months, after that digest it in a gentle heat fourteen days, then separate the Oyl which keep for use.

Salmon says they that please may make it according to the prescription, but he gives an alternative formula which was “to rectify the Oyl from the Flegm, then to grind the Volatile Salt with the Oyl, and so by a long digestion to join them together.” Salmon also tells us that if these drops are distilled from the bones of the skull they are good for apoplexy, vertigo, megrims, &c., but “if you want it for gout of any particular limb it is better to make it from the bones of that limb. The dose is 6 to 12 drops, but it has an evil scent.” You can, however, correct that, and “Elixirate” the preparation, bringing it “even to a Fragrancy” if you add so much Spirit of Nitre as will dissolve the oil, and then mix it with four times its weight of spirit of wine. Then you should give 20 to 60 drops in a glass of Canary. “So you will have a medicine beyond all comparison ten times exceeding the other in worth and efficacy.”

Who was the inventor of this medicine? Salmon says, “The author of this Recipe was not that Goddard whose Recipes and Prescriptions are scattered up and down in several places of this book, but the famous W. Goddard, a great Philosopher and Physician who deserved well of the World in his Day and Time, and who has even in this Remedy left himself an Immortal name. And this is the true Medicine which was purchased of the Doctor by King Charles the Second, so much famed through the whole kingdom, and for which he gave him, as it is reported, fifteen hundred pounds sterling.” Other statements say that Charles bought the formula for £5,000 or £6,000.

Salmon had lived in the reign of Charles II, and may be expected to have been correct in regard to such a recent event. But in the Roll of the Royal College of Physicians by William Munk, M.D., published by the College in 1878 I find the invention of these drops attributed to Jonathan Goddard, M.D., a person of some historical fame, due to a large extent to his association with Oliver Cromwell, whom he accompanied as first physician to his army through his Irish and Scotch campaigns. Cromwell made him Warden of Merton College, Oxford, and in other ways showed his confidence in him. In the Little Parliament which succeeded the Long Parliament Dr. Goddard was the sole representative of the University of Oxford, and became a member of the Council of State. With this record it is not surprising that the doctor did not become a favourite with Charles II. when that monarch returned to London. Dr. Goddard was removed from his Wardenship, but subsequently became Professor of Physic at Gresham College, London, and it was there that he and a few other scientific associates founded the Royal Society. It is difficult to believe that he was the inventor of the drops of which Salmon writes; and it is impossible to accept the statement that he offered, or that the King agreed to purchase, the secret of their composition from him.