Sarsaparilla.--It might be thought that such deception of self and others as has been illustrated in the weapon salve and sympathetic powder would be impossible in our enlightened day. Anyone who thinks so forgets certain incidents of recent times. The story of sarsaparilla is a striking illustration. Few drugs have been more popular in the last half century, and it is even yet popularly supposed to be a wonderful tonic, a cure for many diseases. During the first half of the nineteenth century, when the humoral theory of the causation of diseases was generally accepted, certain German physicians thought they observed that a decoction of sarsaparilla was a sovereign remedy for various ailments having their origin in the blood. The blood was at that time supposed to become impure for many reasons, and the possibility of neutralizing such impurity by medical measures was seriously attempted. As Virchow used to insist, the humoral pathology still holds its ground in popular estimation, and so blood purifiers are favorite remedies, and will doubtless continue to be for at least another generation, until cellular pathology secures a hold on the popular mind. Sarsaparilla came in, then, as a great blood purifier, and was used for ten years by many of the physicians of the world, confident that they were obtaining excellent results from its use. After a time, however, further study of the drug showed that it was inert. Gradually the employment of sarsaparilla as a remedial agent ceased, though it continued to be used as an elegant vehicle in the prescription of nauseating remedies. Only after it had been thus abandoned by the regular profession, was it taken up extensively by others who advertised its virtues widely and secured a great clientele for it. Probably more money has been spent on sarsaparilla during the last fifty years than on any other single drug. Many millions were every year appropriated by rival concerns to advertise its virtues. It has been possible at any time during the last half century to secure any number of people who were willing and ready to declare--and most of them convinced of the truth of what they said--that various preparations of {58} sarsaparilla had cured them of long-standing ills, and that they considered it a life-saving remedy.