An allusion to this renowned proprietary preparation will be found under Citrine Ointment, this Vol., page 126, in connection with the several discordant guesses as to its composition which have been published by eminent authorities. The ointment is mentioned in this section also because of its long history. According to the statement published by its present proprietor it is the oldest proprietary remedy still sold in this country. The present proprietor, Mr. Stephen Green, inherited it from his grandfather of the same name who died in 1874. He acquired the property by marrying (in 1825) Selina Folgham, who brought to him one-fifth share in the rights as a part of her marriage settlement, and after her death in 1831 the elder Stephen Green bought up the shares of other relatives. This Selina Folgham was a daughter of another Selina Folgham, _née_ Singleton, granddaughter of Thomas Singleton who died in 1779, and whose tomb, I understand, may still be seen in Lambeth churchyard. This Thomas Singleton was the first of the Singletons. Before his time the ointment appears to have been known as “Dr. Johnson’s Golden Ointment,” and the present owners claim that it was first made by a “Dr. Johnson” in 1596, and that it was left by him to a certain George Hind whose great-granddaughter married the Thomas Singleton already mentioned. MRS. STEPHENS’S CURE FOR STONE. Perhaps the most notable recognition of a nostrum in English history was the Act of Parliament passed in 1739 entitled “An Act for providing a reward to Joanna Stephens upon a proper discovery to be made by her for the use of the publick of the Medicines prepared by her for the Cure of the Stone.” Mrs. Stephens was a widow and professed to have received the recipe from her late husband. A number of persons in the higher classes of society had been cured, or believed they had been, by taking her remedy, and in the year 1738 a movement was started to buy the formula from her for the benefit of the public. This was specially advocated in the _Gentleman’s Magazine_, and the lady being approached expressed her willingness to sell the recipe for £5,000. An account was opened at Drummond’s Bank, and £500 was subscribed in the first few days. Dr. David Hartley, of Bath, was the chief organiser of the fund, and the Bishop of Bath and Wells, the Principal of Brasenose College, Oxford, and other responsible persons wrote letters testifying their knowledge of the good effects produced by Mrs. Stephens’s treatment. Hartley published an account of “Ten Cases of Persons who have taken Mrs. Stephens’s Medicines for Stone.” When Hartley died Warburton in his letters referred to him as “a philanthropic visionary, a martyr to Mrs. Stephens’s medicine.” It is said in some accounts that Horace Walpole was one of Mrs. Stephens’s cures.