"A tooth ought not to be taken out, for by doing so the remaining
teeth will be loosened. If the pain is very acute and interferes
with eating or drinking, then the tooth may be extracted;
otherwise, it should be left. Take a bream about ten ounces in
weight, rip it open and insert 1/10 of an ounce of powdered
arsenic. Then sew up the body and hang it up in the wind where it
is not exposed to the sun or accessible to cats and rats. After
being thus hung for seven days, a kind of hoar-frost will have
formed upon the scales of the fish. Preserve this, using for each
tooth about as much as covers one scale. When required, spread it
on a piece of any kind of plaster, press it with the finger on to
the aching place, and let it stick there. Then let the patient
cough, and the tooth will fall out of itself. This prescription
has been tested by Dr. Wang."
Another Method.
"Take a head of garlic and pound it up to a pulp. Mix it up
thoroughly with one or two candareens' weight of white dragon's
bones, and apply it to the suffering part. In a little while the
tooth will drop out."
It will be noticed that the above descriptions are neither without one or other of two characteristics always to be found in the composition of Chinese remedies. In the first recipe, the ingredients are simple enough, and all this is required is time, seven days being necessary for its preparation. Now, as it is very unlikely that any one would collect the "hoar-frost" deposit from the scales of a bream stuffed with arsenic, in anticipation of a future toothache, and as he would probably have got well long before the expiration of the seven days if he set to work to make his medicine only when the tooth began to ache, the genius of the physician and the efficacy of the recipe are alike secure from attack. In the second case, the very existence of one of the drugs mentioned is, to say the least, apocryphal; and although such can be purchased at the shops of native druggists, any complaint on the part of a duped patient would be met by the simple answer, that the white dragon's bones he bought could not possibly have been genuine!
A few days after the above incident, we returned to the dentist's stall, and asked him if he had any powder that would draw out a tooth by mere application to the gum or to the tooth itself? He replied that such a powder certainly existed, and was commonly manufactured in all parts of China, but that he himself was out of it at the moment. He added, that if we would call again on the 4th of the 4th moon, before 12 o'clock in the day, he should be in a position to satisfy our demands.
In conclusion, we append a quotation from the China Review, which appeared in print after our own sketch was written:—
"Despite the oft-repeated assertion as to painless, or at least
easy, dentistry in China, very few people seem prepared to admit
that teeth are constantly extracted in the way described by (I
think) a former correspondent of the Review. He stated that a
white powder was rubbed on the gums of the patient, after which
the tooth was easily pulled from its socket; and this I can
substantiate, noting, however, that the action of the powder
(corrosive sublimate) is not quite so rapid as represented. A
short time since I witnessed an operation of this kind. The
operator rubbed the powder on the gum as described, but then
directed the patient to wait a little. After perhaps ten minutes'
interval, he again rubbed the gum, and then, introducing his thumb
into the mouth, pressed heavily against the tooth (which was a
large molar). The man winced for a second as I heard the 'click'
of the separation, but almost before he could cry out, the dentist
gripped the tooth with his forefinger and thumb, and with very
little violence pulled it out. The gum bled considerably, and I
examined the tooth so as to satisfy myself that there was no
deception. It had an abscess at the root of the fang, and was
undoubtedly what it professed to be. When the operation was over,
the patient washed his mouth out with cold water, paid fifteen
cash and departed."
MEDICAL SCIENCE
In spite of the glowing reports issued annually from various foreign hospitals for natives, and the undeniable good, though desultory and practically infinitesimal, that is being worked by these institutions, we cannot blind ourselves to the fact that western medical science is not making more rapid strides than many other innovations in the great struggle against Chinese prejudice and distrust. By far the majority of our servants and those natives who come most in contact with foreigners never dream of consulting a European doctor; or if they do, that is quite as much as can be said, for we may pronounce it a fact that they never take either his advice or his medicine. They still prefer to appear with large dabs of green plaster stuck on either temple, and to drink loathsome concoctions of marvellous drugs, compounded according to eternal principles laid down many centuries ago. In serious cases, when they employ their own doctors, they are apt to mark, as Bacon said, the hits but not the misses; and failure of human skill is generally regarded as resulting from the interposition of divine will. Directly, however, a foreigner comes upon the scene they forget at once that medicine is an uncertain science, and expect not only a sure but an almost instantaneous recovery; and, unfortunately, a single failure is quite enough to undo the good of many months of successful practice. One Chinaman bitterly complained to us of a foreign doctor, and sweepingly denounced the whole system of western treatment, because the practitioner alluded to had failed to cure his mother, aged eighty, of a very severe paralytic stroke. A certain percentage of natives are annually benefited by advice and medicine, both of which are provided gratis, and go home to tell the news and exhibit themselves as living proofs of the foreign devils' skill; but in many instances their friends either believe that magical arts have been brought to bear, or that after all a Chinese doctor would have treated the case with equal success, and accordingly the number of patients increases in a ratio very disproportionate to the amount of good really effected. Besides, if faith in European doctors was truly spreading to any great extent, we should hear of wealthy Chinamen regularly calling them in and contributing towards the income of those now in full practice at the Treaty ports. It is absurd to point to isolated cases in a nation of several hundred millions, and argue that progress is being made because General This or Prefect That consented to have an abscess lanced by a foreign surgeon, and sent him a flowery letter of thanks with a couple of Chinese hams after the operation. The Chinese as a people laugh at our medical science, and, we are bound to say, with some show of justice on their side. They have a medical literature of considerable extent, and though we may condemn it wholesale as a farrago of utter nonsense, it is not so to the Chinese, who fondly regard their knowledge in this branch of science as one among many precious heirlooms which has come down to them from times of the remotest antiquity.
We alluded in the last Sketch to a work in eight small volumes called "New Collection of Tried Prescriptions," a book which answers to our "Domestic Medicine," and professes to supply well-authenticated remedies for some of the most common ills that flesh is heir to. This book gives a fair idea of the principles and practice of medical science in China. It is divided into sections and subdivided into chapters under such headings as the eye, the teeth, the hand, the leg, &c. &c. We gave a specimen of the prescriptions herein brought together in our late remarks upon the methods of extracting teeth, but it would be doing an injustice to the learning of its author if we omitted to point out that in this book remedies are provided, not only for such simple complaints as chilblains or the stomach-ache, but for all kinds of serious complications arising from the evil influence of demons or devils. One whole chapter is devoted to "Extraordinary Diseases," and teaches anxious relatives to give instant relief in cases of "the face swelling as big as a peck measure, and little men three feet long appearing in the eyes." "Seeing one thing as if it were two," would hardly be classed by London doctors as an extraordinary disease, and is not altogether unknown even amongst foreigners in China. "Seeing things upside down after drinking wine," belongs in the same category, and may be cited in proof of a position take up by most observers, namely, that the Chinese are a sober people. "Seeing kaleidoscopic views which turn to beautiful women," "the flesh becoming hard as a stone and sounding like a bell when tapped," "objecting to eat in company," and such diseases have each a special prescription offered by the learned Dr Wang with the utmost gravity, and accepted in good faith by many a confiding patient.
Chinamen look with suspicion on the sober treatment of the West, where no joss-stick is burnt, and no paper money is offered on the altar of some favourite P'u-sa; though, if they knew the whole truth, they would discover that intercessory prayers for the recovery of sick persons are considered by many of us to be of equal importance with the administration of pills and draughts. Further, like our own agricultural classes, they have no faith in medicine of any kind which does not make its presence felt not only quickly but powerfully. This last desire was amply fulfilled in the case of one poor coolie who applied to an acquaintance of ours for some foreign medicine to cure a sick headache and bilious attack from which he was suffering. Our friend immediately bethought himself of a Seidlitz powder; but when all was ready, the acid in one wine-glass of water and the salt in another, the devil entered into him, and he gave them to his victim to drink one after the other. The result was indescribable, for the mixture fizzed inside, and the unfortunate coolie passed such a mauvais quart d'heure as effectually to cure his experimenting master from any further indulgence in practical jokes of so extremely dangerous a nature.