The estimated cost of the ingredients for 3 fluid ounces is one-third of a penny. THE ILLS OF HUMANITY. Several examples have been encountered in previous chapters of the system of getting into personal communication with a possible customer, and addressing to him a series of letters warning him of the dire consequences should he fail to purchase the advertiser’s “treatment.” Over and beyond the chance of frightening the customer, the system, which seems to have originated in the United States of America, has the advantages that a profession can be made of adapting the treatment to the individual case, that the price may be lowered if the charge first made is considered too high and that possibly, in return for this concession, testimonials and the names of other sufferers may be obtained. A letter-writing system of this kind is found at work behind the advertisement from which the following paragraphs are extracted: Free! Free! To the Sick and Ailing Everywhere. The Cure for your Disease—Delivered Free—Free for the Asking—Free to You. To the sick—the suffering—to every man and woman victim of organic disease—local trouble or broken general health—Dr. Kidd’s offer of free treatments is given in the absolute faith and sincere belief that they can and will stop disease, cure it, and lift you up again to health and vigour.... Rheumatism, kidney trouble, Bright’s disease, diabetes, heart disease, partial paralysis, bladder troubles, stomach and bowel troubles, piles, catarrh, bronchitis, weak lungs, consumption, asthma, chronic coughs, nervousness, all female troubles, lumbago, skin diseases, scrofula, impure blood, general debility, organic vital ailments, etc., are cured to remain and continue cured.... Will you let me do this for you—will you let me prove it—brother and sister sufferers? Are you willing to trust a master physician, who not only MAKES this offer, but PUBLISHES it and then sends the test and proof of his remedies without a penny of cost to anyone except himself?... My home office is at Fort Wayne, Indiana, U.S.A., but for the benefit of my thousands of English patients, I have established an office in London. Please address Dr. James W. Kidd, “Box” No. ____, E.C. The advertisement was illustrated by the portrait of a man who, it might be assumed, was the “master physician” in question, but that in a book of some hundred pages, entitled “The Ills of Humanity, by Dr. James W. Kidd, Fort Wayne, Ind.,” issued apparently by “the J. W. Kidd Co.,” there is a portrait of Dr. James W. Kidd, which seems to represent a totally different person.