"O, I take them without stopping to think about it," was her reply; "and I beg your majesty will do the same."
Still the dying man shook his head, and appealed to General Montholon, who gave a similar answer.
"Do you think it will relieve me from this oppression, doctor?" he finally asked of Dr. Antommarchi.
"I do, my dear sire; and I entreat your majesty to drink it."
"What is it?" asked Napoleon, eying the glass suspiciously.
"Merely some orange water," was the reply.
"Give it me, then;" and the emperor seized the cup and drank the contents at one draught.
"The emperor has no faith in medicine, and never takes any," said Las Cases, in his memoirs.
About the year 1723, a man sprang into notice in Paris, styling himself Dr. Villars. He claimed relationship to the Duke Louis Hector Villars, and the Abbe Pons is represented as saying that "Dr. Villars is superior to the great marshal, Louis Hector. The duke kills men,--the doctor prolongs their existence."
Villars declared that his uncle, who had been killed at the age of one hundred years, and who might, but for his accidental death, have lived another half century, had confided to him the secret of his longevity. It consisted of a medicine, which, if taken according to directions accompanying each bottle, would prolong the life of the fortunate possessor _ad infinitum_.
Villars employed several assistants to stand on the corners of the streets, and who, when a funeral was seen passing, would exclaim,--
"Ah! if the unfortunate deceased had but taken Dr. Villars' nostrum, he might now be riding in his own carriage, instead of in a hearse."
"Of course," says our authority, "the rabble believed the testimony of such respectable and _disinterested_ appearing witnesses, and made haste to obtain the doctor's nostrum--and instructions." And here is where the laugh comes in.
The patient received positive instructions to live temperately, to eat moderately, bathe daily, to avoid all excesses, to take steady and moderate exercise, to rise early, and, in fact, to obey all the laws of nature. Of course those who persevered in these instructions were greatly benefited thereby, and the dupes, attributing their recovery to the use of the nostrum, lauded the doctor.