As an indispensable adjunct to the doctor at this period, let us now mention the apothecary and the bath-keeper.
The patron of the apothecaries was Saint Nicholas; they belonged to the corporation of grocers, where they were represented by three members. Their central bureau was at the Cloister Saint Opportune.
The inspection of drug stores and apothecary shops in Paris occurred once a year, and was made by three members elected from the central bureau and two doctors in medicine. A druggist in Paris served four years as an apprentice and six years as an under-dispenser; then the applicant was obliged to pass two examinations, and, finally, five extra examinations, the latter in the presence of the master apothecaries and two doctors. Notwithstanding their oath[8] to not prescribe medicine for the sick and not to sell drugs without a doctor’s written order, druggists then, as now, had frequent conflicts with physicians, as the latter are ever jealous of non professional interference and always asserting supremacy.
However, it is well to say that druggists never violated the rule relative to strict inspection of all drugs before using such articles. All medicines were passed at the central bureau before any apothecary would purchase for dispensing purposes.
As to bath-keepers, they belonged in antique times, as now, more to the order of empirics; their history dates far back to the period when the Romans introduced their bathing system into Gaul—a system which was perpetuated up to as late as the sixteenth century.
The baths constructed by the ancients and destroyed by the barbarians, reappeared again in the Middle Ages, under the names of vapor baths and furnace baths. These baths were shops, usually kept by barbers, where one could be sheared, sweated or leeched by a tonsorial artist. All the world then took baths—even the monks washed themselves sometimes; in fact, almost every monastery had its bath-rooms, where the poor could wash and be bled without pay.
In those days gentlemen bathed before receiving the order of chivalry. When one gave a ball it was customary and gallant to offer all the guests, especially the ladies, a free bath. When Louis XI. went out to sup with his loyal subjects, the honest tradespeople of Paris, he always found a hot bath at his disposal. Finally, it was considered a severe penance to forbid a person from bathing, as was done in the case of Henry IV., who was excommunicated.
Paris had many bath-houses. From early dawn until sunset the streets were filled, with cryers for bath-houses, who invited all passers-by to enter. In the time of Charles VI., bath-keepers introduced vapor baths. Some of these latter were entirely given up to women; others were reserved for the King and gentlemen of the court. The price of vapor baths was fixed by Police ordinance at twenty centimes for a vapor bath and forty centimes for those who washed afterwards. This price was subject to revision only at the pleasure of the municipal authorities.
During times of epidemics vapor baths were discontinued. It was for sanitary reasons, probably, that an order of the Mayor of Paris, named Delamere, forbade all persons taking vapor baths until after Christmas eve, “on penalty of a heavy fine.” This same proclamation was repeated by act of Parliament on December 13th, 1553, “the penalty corporeal punishment for offending bath-keepers.”
Parisian vapor baths had such wide-spread reputations and success that an Italian doctor of the sixteenth century by the name of Brixanius, who arrived in Paris, wrote the following verses: