"Persimmons! Now I come to think of it," says the man who had a faint idea of what persimmons were, "they make beer, first-rate beer of persimmons, in the South, and it's my opinion, that Joe Bunker is going into persimmon beer business; as you say, he may be sick—persimmon beer may be the California cure-all; in either case, let us forward the persimmons without delay!"
Now persimmons never ripen until touched pretty smartly with Jack Frost. This was in September; persimmons were mostly full grown, but not ripe. A large keg of them was ordered from Jersey, and as fast as Adams & Co.'s great Express to San Francisco could take them out, the persimmons went!
Counsellor Bunker, relying upon his friends to forward without delay the tools and remedial agents to make his fortune in the pill business, went to work, got him an office, changed his name, and added an M. D. to it, had a sign painted, advertised his shop, and informed the public that on such a time he would open, and guarantee to cure all ills, from lumbago to liver complaint, from toothache to lock-jaw, spring fever to yaller janders, and in his enthusiasm, he sat down with a ream of paper, to count up the profits, and calculate the time it would take to get his pile of gold dust and start for home.
The day arrived that Doctor Phlebotonizem was to open, and he found customers began to call, and sure enough, in comes a large keg, direct through from the States, to his address; the freight bill on it was pretty considerable, but Joe out and paid it, rejoicing to think that now he was all right, and that if the proprietors of gold dust and the lumbago, or any of the various ills set forth in his catalogue of human woes, had spare change, he would soon find them out. He closed his door, opened his cask—
"What in the name of everlasting sin and misery is this?" was the first burst, upon feeling the fine saw dust, and seeing, nicely packed, the green and purple, round and glossy—he couldn't tell what.
"Pills? No, good gracious, they can't be pills—smell queer—some mistake—can't be any mistake—my name on the cask—(tastes one of the 'article')—O! by thunder! (tastes again)—I'm blasted, they (tastes again) are, by Jove, persimmons! Ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ho! ho! he! he! ha! ha! ha!"
And the ex-counsellor of modern law roared until he grew livid in the face.
"I see—ha! ha! I see; they have misunderstood every line I wrote them, except the last, and that—ha! ha! ha!—for my direction to send out my stuff per Simmons, they send me persimmons! Ha! ha! ha! ho! ho!"
But, after enjoying the fun of the matter, ex-counsellor Bunker discovered the thing was nothing to laugh at; patients were at the door—if he did not soon prescribe for their cases, his now numerous creditors would prescribe for him! What was to be done? Very dull and prosy people often become enterprising and imaginative, to a wonderful degree, when put to their trumps. This philosophical fact applied to ex-counsellor Bunker's case exactly. He was there to better his fortune, and he felt bound to do it, persimmons or no persimmons. It occurred to him, as those infernal persimmons had cost him something, they ought to bring in something. By the aid of starch and sugar, Doctor Phlebotonizem converted some hundreds of the smallest persimmons into pills—sugar-coated pills—warranted to cure about all the ills flesh was heir to, at $2 each dose. One generally constituted a dose for a full-grown person, and as the patient left with a countenance much "puckered up," and rarely returned, the pseudo M. D. concluded there was virtue in persimmon pills, and so, after disposing of his stock to first-rate advantage, the doctor paid off his bills; tired of the pill trade, he vamosed the ranche with about funds enough to reach home, and explain to his friends the difference between per Simmons and persimmons!