FELL REDUCING TREATMENT.
In pushing this “treatment,” advertised by an Association giving an address in London, the system of letters in series is resorted to, but a small package, containing 112 tablets, can be purchased for 6s. 6d.
An advertisement ran as follows:
Fat People given Free Treatment.
We have such marvellous records of reductions effected in hundreds of cases with the Fell Reducing Treatment, that we have decided, for a limited period only, to give free trial treatments.
7 lb. per Week Reduction is Guaranteed, without dieting. Perfectly harmless, pleasant; easy and quick results. Send no money. Simply address the Fell Formula Association, 340, Century House, 205, Regent Street, London, W., enclosing stamp to pay postage, when a free supply in plain wrapper will be immediately forwarded.
A free supply was sent on application, accompanied by a letter and sundry circulars; other letters followed at intervals, and extracts from some of these will be given. They were printed in imitation of typewriting, with the name and address typed in, so as to give the appearance of being personal letters. It will be noted that when a customer has been attracted by the advertisement that “7 lb. per week reduction is guaranteed, without dieting,” very much smaller claims are gradually substituted.
Esteemed Friend,
Your favour of recent date has received our careful attention, and we take pleasure in sending you a three days’ trial of the Fell Reducing Treatment. Before taking it, weigh yourself, and then again in three days, on the same scales and in the same clothes, you will find you have lost some 3 lb. in weight.
An abnormal condition like corpulency requires that the antidote directly reaches the seat of the complaint, and by these Reducers the blood will be purified, and all the organs of the body restored to natural healthy action, while the germs of the disease will be entirely eradicated from the system, so that the superfluous fat, which will be removed will not return....
At the present stage of the disease in your case, we can positively assure you that under our treatment a marked improvement will begin at once, and continue steadily until a complete reduction in weight, with all the benefits to general health, is effected. Unlike most other methods of treatment, the action begins immediately and the sufferer feels better almost from the beginning, and it is with confidence that we advise you to begin a course of treatment with our Reducing Preparation at once.
Our regular terms and prices are 26s. for a case containing three 11s. boxes, whereby a saving of 7s. is effected.
If you take up the treatment in this manner you can be sure of having sufficient of the Tablets to take you through to a quick reduction. Single boxes of Tablets, however, are supplied at 11s. and smaller sizes at 6s. 6d. The 6s. 6d. box covers a ten days’ treatment, while the 11s. boxes contain three times the quantity of the 6s. 6d.
This letter was not answered, but before long another was received which contained the following passages:
In sending you the sample of the “Fell” Preparation, we did so more to show the thorough nature of our treatment than from the expectation that material benefit would be realized from same. As you require to bring about a certain reduction you must necessarily undergo a certain course of treatment. A pound a day reduction results in many cases, and there is every reason to expect that such reduction can be effected in yours. A serious affliction such as obesity is not to be removed by any temporary remedy or with a few days’ treatment....
Remember, a 26s. case contains sufficient treatment to reduce materially the most stubborn and long standing case, while an 11s. box contains three times the quantity of the 6s. 6d. box....
A supply was sent for and was accompanied by the following letter:
Dear Sir,
I have despatched to you the Tablets together with directions and instructions. I ask you to carefully observe same, and am confident if you do so, you will very soon see most beneficial results....
I am confident that you will be highly delighted with the splendid effects of the Tablets at the end of a few weeks if you follow carefully my instructions and are prompt and regular in taking the Tablets. I am sending you herewith printed instructions and rules for diet. You will note that our suggestion as to what you should eat, if strictly followed, will not work any hardship, and that you will never go hungry....
This letter, signed “________ ‘Adviser, Fell Formula Association,’” was accompanied by a printed circular giving rules as to diet, etc., and by a “symptom blank,” to be filled up by the patient in order to obtain particulars of “the Fell System of Simple Muscular Movements for Reducing the Weight and Increasing the Strength, in combination with the ‘Fell’ Reducing Treatment”; it appears from the latter that particulars of these exercises are only supplied when the 26s. case is sent for.
A fourth letter dealt with generalities and recommended taking the reducing treatment in increased quantities, but after an interval a fifth was received, enclosing a booklet advocating the use of “the Century Thermal Bath Cabinet,” from which the following are extracts:
... We have strongly recommended the Home Turkish Bath that it may be used at least once a week as an adjunct to the Reducing Treatment; hence our affiliation to the “Century Thermal” Bath Cabinet, Ltd., whose home cabinet is built on such lines as to render it the best device extant for taking Hot Air or Vapour Baths.
... in any event, it were better to spend the required amount, for were the cost as much as £10 in all (it has but rarely exceeded that) the expense is out of all proportion to the ultimate benefit.
... with the Fell treatment no case of obesity, in either sex, can fail to be reduced if assisted with the regular use of the Hot Air Bath.
Booklets entitled Corpulence or Obesity. Its causes, results, and successful treatment: The Treatment of Obesity by the “Fell” Reducing Treatment: and Make Muscle of your Fat, were also sent at different times. The following extracts from two of these scarcely appear consistent:
A Guarantee to Reduce Weight.
It is not our purpose to indulge in empty talk only, or in unconsequential boasts. We are prepared to, and do, give a positive guarantee that the Fell Treatment, used in conjunction with the Muscular System, will reduce the fat of any person—provided our instructions are adhered to—in the space of a very few weeks.
Do We Guarantee?
We are frequently asked this question personally and by letter, and reply emphatically—No, we do not. To say Yes—would be illogical and certainly demoralising.
A guarantee that any medical remedy or curative will absolutely effect its stated purpose is misleading, deceptive, delusive, and is a trap to ensnare, not intelligent individuals, but the unwary, the unsophisticated, and those utterly unable to discriminate as to the merits or demerits of any so-called specific.
The dose was stated to be:
Nine tablets daily. Three taken three times a day before meals. They may be taken as pills or dissolved on the tongue.
The tablets had an average weight of 1 grain. Analysis showed them to contain 90·8 per cent. of milk sugar, 2·4 per cent. of greasy matter, which appeared to be a mixture of stearic acid and paraffin, evidently employed as a lubricant in making the tablets, and 6·8 per cent. of an extract which agreed well in its characters with extract of Fucus vesiculosus; its identity was further indicated by analysis of the ash. Each tablet would thus contain:
| Extract of bladderwrack | 0·07 | grain. |
| Milk sugar | 0·91 | ” |
The estimated cost of the ingredients for 112 tablets is ¼d.
NELSON LLOYD SAFE
REDUCING TREATMENT.
In this instance the bait of free trial for a fortnight is held out in the advertisements issued from an address in London; the following are extracts from one advertisement:
I myself am a member of a family many of whom died prematurely after much mental and physical suffering, arising from corpulence. While studying medicine for my degree, I saw the signs of the family complaint in myself. I naturally sought to avert what I for some time feared as being my hereditary fate. It was when I had almost given up hope that I discovered a cure for my condition, which all the time grew worse, in spite of my hopeful trials of all advertised and unadvertised remedies for stoutness. I at last gave up expecting a cure from other people. I experimented with my own thought-out remedies, and, happily, at last my perseverance—or, rather, my desperation—succeeded....
The result of several years’ study and experience has only served to make my treatment more and more successful....
I specially invite those who have tried other remedies for reducing weight without success to write me for:
I. A copy of my book, “The Scientific Treatment of Obesity” (just published, price 6d.), thoroughly deals with the subject in a popular, readable style....
II. Two photos of the lady referred to above, with her letter giving full particulars of her cure.
III. Everything required for a complete fourteen days’ free trial treatment.
I make no charge for all the above, but ask you to enclose sixpence (by postal order), just to cover the expenses of carriage, packing, and dispatch of parcel.
Application for the “Treatment” brought a box containing 42 tablets, a copy of the booklet mentioned above, and a letter and form for particulars. A few extracts will suffice to show what was claimed and the methods adopted.
From the booklet:
Different cases vary so much that the same treatment is never exactly suited to any two cases. Moreover, the treatment has to be modified as the patient progresses, the condition of the individual being periodically allowed for.... I wish to make it perfectly clear that not only do I offer every client the full benefit of practically a life-study of the whole subject of corpulence, but that I guarantee to effect a cure of every case I take up.
There are no “ifs” and “buts” about my promises to my patients. I undertake to reduce corpulence by rational individual treatment in each and every case entrusted to me, and I undertake to promise (sic) that my treatment is in no way weakening, that it is permanent, and also that it has absolutely no ill effects.
From the first letter:
One of the Tablets should be taken after each of the three chief meals of the day for the next fortnight. I suggest that if convenient you weigh yourself before beginning the course, and again in fourteen days’ time, with the same scales and in the same clothes. You will find you have lost weight, while improving in your general condition.... My course of Treatment lasts a month except in unusual cases. The tablets I have sent you for the first fortnight will at once put a stop to the fat-forming habit of the body; these tablets are taken during the first fortnight in all cases, and while excellent results follow even in this brief period, they need to be followed up from the fifteenth day by additional and different remedies, adapted to each individual case.
In order to prepare this part of your Treatment I shall need to have before me full particulars of your case, which you can easily give me by filling up the Consultation Form enclosed herewith....
My fee for a month’s course of Treatment is one guinea, but you will see that I have given you credit for the first fortnight’s Treatment sent you herewith, because this is free in accordance with my offer through the Press. This means that by sending at once you can have one month’s complete treatment for half cost. To secure this concession you must, however, send me the Consultation Form filled up, and remittance for 10s. 6d. in time to continue your Treatment on the fifteenth day, and I must have at least three clear days in which to consider your case and prepare and post your Treatment to reach you in time.
The “Consultation Form” contained questions as to age, height, weight, chest and abdomen measurements, details of bodily condition, habits, and diet; this was filled up so as to represent an ordinary case of moderate obesity, and returned with 10s. 6d. In the next letter it was stated:
I am preparing your second fortnight’s treatment, and it will be forwarded in due course, but I feel I should like to take this opportunity of pointing out to you that there are special features about your case which, while not preventing the accomplishment of the improvement you desire, will, however, entail a little longer course of treatment than one month.
In my opinion your case requires a two months’ course of my treatment, at the end of which time the results will be all that you can desire. I thought it only right you should know this, and I would like you to tell me if you will take the full course my experience leads me to advise you.
My fee for the two months’ course is two guineas, but you have already standing to your credit the sum of one guinea, being one half-guinea allowed for first fortnight’s free trial, and the other half-guinea you have just sent me.
I should like you to take the full course my experience tells me is necessary for you, and if you now send me the one guinea balance, I will at once arrange for the supply of all the necessary remedies to you at the proper intervals.
The second fortnight’s treatment consisted of “special tablets” and a liquid; these were accompanied by a further letter, a diet table, and a report form, to be filled in and returned after 10 days.
The three kinds of medicine were examined with results as follows:
The preliminary tablets.—There were 42 in the box, and the directions were to take one three times a day after meals.
They were sugar-coated and coloured red externally; after removal of the coating, they had an average weight of 4·7 grains. Analysis showed them to consist principally of substances of extract nature, together with an amount of liquorice fibre representing about 20 per cent. of powdered liquorice; iodine was present in organic combination, and a nitrogenous substance; the amount of nitrogen was 0·51 per cent., representing 3·2 per cent. of proteid; no tissue of thyroid gland was present, and the nitrogenous material was probably contained in an extract of this substance. The remainder possessed the general characters of extract of Fucus vesiculosus, and its identity was also indicated by analysis of the ash; some gum was also present, and some indication was obtained of another substance also, which, however, possessed no important characters, and was probably also of the nature of excipient. The formula indicated by the results was thus:
| Extract of bladderwrack | 2·5 | grains. |
| Proteid of thyroid gland | 0·15 | grain. |
| Powdered liquorice | 0·9 | ” |
| Excipient and moisture, etc. | q.s. | |
| In one tablet. | ||
The “special” tablets.—There were 33 of these in a box; the directions were to take one after the mid-day and one after the evening meal. They were sugar-coated but not coloured. After removal of the coating, they had an average weight of 4·6 grains. Analysis showed their composition to agree qualitatively with that of the preliminary tablets, but the nitrogenous material and the liquorice were present in somewhat larger amounts. The following formula was indicated by the results:
| Extract of bladderwrack | 2·5 | grains. |
| Proteid of thyroid gland | 0·19 | grain. |
| Powdered liquorice | 1·4 | ” |
| Excipient and moisture, etc. | q.s. | |
| In one tablet. | ||
The liquid.—Two fluid ounces were supplied, the directions being to take 30 drops in a wineglassful of cold water the last thing at night before retiring and on rising in the morning. Analysis showed this to contain alcohol, glycerine, nitrogenous matter, a little iodine in organic combination, and substances of extract nature; the character of the extract and the composition of the ash again pointed to its being derived from Fucus vesiculosus; the amount of nitrogen was determined and the equivalent amount of proteid matter calculated; the alcohol and glycerine were also determined quantitatively: the amount of extract of bladderwrack could only be arrived at by difference, supported by the probability that the alcohol was all, or nearly all, added in the form of the fluid extract of this drug, and the figure can therefore only be given with reservation; there were also indications of some small amount of flavouring and colouring matter having been added. The approximate formula appeared to be:
| Proteid of thyroid gland | 0·3 | part. |
| Liquid extract of bladderwrack | 32 | fluid parts. |
| Glycerine | 12 | ” |
| In 100 fluid parts. | ||
The amount of thyroid actually represented by the nitrogenous matter found in these three preparations was too uncertain for an estimate of the cost price to be of value.
CORPULIN, AND DALLOFF’S
TEA “CONTRE L’OBESITÉ”
GRAZIANA ZEHRKUR.
Of the German preparations examined by Dr. Zernik two contain bladderwrack. One called Corpulin contains also tamarind and cascara sagrada. The other, Dalloff’s Tea “Contre l’Obesité,” as to which the advertisers assert that “regular use leads to the removal of superfluous adipose tissue and the person becomes healthy and attains old age” was found to consist of a mixture of the leaves of senna, bearberry (Uvœ ursi) and lavender, and anthylla flowers. Any action it may have depends probably on the senna leaves. It is sold in boxes costing 7s. 6d. or 4s. 6d.; the smaller box contains 80 grammes, or nearly 3 ounces of the powder.
Graziana Reducing Treatment (Zehrkur) is sent out in parcels costing 3s. Each contains a packet of a greyish-brown powder, a box of 40 starch capsules, each containing 0·2 gramme of a light brown finely-divided powder, and a box of 86 pills, each weighing 0·22 gramme. The chief ingredient of each of the preparations is powdered Fucus. The pills contain some substance yielding emodin, the purgative principle, or one of the purgative principles, of aloes, rhubarb, buckthorn, and senna, and also some sulphates and chlorides.
CHAPTER X.
SKIN DISEASES.
Proprietary articles for the cure of eczema and other skin affections include several which are as widely advertised as any nostrums of any kind. Some of them are at first offered at the comparatively low price of 1s. 1½d.; but in almost every case the further information supplied on application shows that what is really recommended is a “treatment,” including an ointment or other application, a special soap, and a medicine to be taken internally, and often also a dusting powder, and occasionally other articles. The importance of persisting in the treatment is strongly emphasised, with the result that anyone who once lays out 1s. 1½d. is likely to be drawn into spending quite a considerable sum. Only a few out of the long list which might be made of these articles have been analysed, but the results throw sufficient light on the general nature of the whole class. The most striking point about them is perhaps the extremely commonplace nature of the drugs selected, although the vendors in some instances would have the buyer believe that the preparation sold is the result of years of patient experiment.