"From every quarter men and women, both white and colored, pressed forward to give their experience. Their stories were grotesque and curious enough, but no matter what their ailments, cures had resulted in every case. At the end of half an hour, while the experience meeting was at its acme, the fakir abruptly closed it, saying, in a regretful voice, that the rest would have to wait until the next evening to tell of their cures, as he now wanted those to come forward who had not been cured by the medicine bought on the previous evening. He stood in silence with folded arms for three minutes. No one having come forward, the voice of this arrant charlatan rang out in stentorian tones, 'All, _all_ have been cured! We have cured _everyone_!' Then another 300 bottles were sold in a jiffy, I myself being one of the fortunate purchasers. The chief of this outfit stopped in the hotel where I was. After dinner the next day, I made his acquaintance in the smoking room, saying I was a doctor, too; that I had attended two of his soirees, bought his medicine and was greatly interested in it. I surprised him by the statement that his medicine was made by M. & Co., wholesale druggists of Cincinnati, and that it was fluid extract of podophyllin. He stared for some moments, but made no reply. I continued, 'I know M.'s fluid extract, as his process of its manufacture is peculiar, and differs from other manufacturers in this, that he exhausts the root by percolation with alcohol, ether and glycerine, giving the product a sweetish taste and a slight ethereal odor.' The man asked if I was also a chemist. I replied, 'Yes, I once lectured in a medical college in Cincinnati on drugs and their uses, and I can readily tell fluid extracts by their taste, odor and physical characteristics.' "After some hesitation, he said, 'Yes, this is M.'s podophyllin _and nothing else_.' I inquired if he attributed all his success to the medicine. He answered, 'No, for once in Missouri the mandrake ran out before a new lot arrived. We found something like it in a drug store of the town, and the people got well just the same. _If the people believe you can cure them, and have faith in your medicine, they get well anyway, or they think they do, which is the same thing._' The fakirs remained one week, sold 2,100 bottles, and presumably cured 2,100 people, as no one came forward to reclaim his dollar for the medicine, which was contained in a two-drachm vial of 120 drops. A dose was one drop after each meal in one spoonful of water.