Some Alcohol Percentages.
Hostetter's Bitters contain, according to an official state analysis, 44 per cent, of alcohol; Lydia Pinkham appeals to suffering womanhood with 20 per cent, of alcohol; Hood's Sarsaparilla cures "that tired feeling" with 18 per cent.; Burdock's Blood Bitters, with 25 per cent.; Ayer's Sarsaparilla, with 26 per cent., and Paine's Celery Compound, with 21 per cent. The fact is that any of these remedies could be interchanged with Peruna or with each other, so far as general effect goes, though the iodid of potassium in the sarsaparilla class might have some effect (as likely to be harmful as helpful ) which would be lacking in the simpler mixtures.
If this class of nostrum is so harmful, asks the attentive reader of newspaper advertising columns, how explain the indorsements of so many people of prominence and reputation? "Men of prominence and reputation" in this connection means Peruna, for Peruna has made a specialty of high government officials and people in the public eye. In a self-gratulatory dissertation the Peruna Company observes in substance that, while the leading minds of the nation have hitherto shrunk from the publicity attendant on commending any patent medicine, the transcendent virtues of Peruna have overcome this amiable modesty, and, one and all, they stand forth its avowed champions. This is followed by an ingenious document headed "Fifty Members of Congress Send Letters of Indorsement to the Inventor of the Great Catarrh Remedy, Pe-ru-na," and quoting thirty-six of the letters. Analysis of these letters brings out the singular circumstance that in twenty-one of the thirty-six there is no indication that the writer has ever tasted the remedy which he so warmly praises. As a sample, and for the benefit of lovers of ingenious literature, I reprint the following from a humorous member of Congress:
"My secretary has as bad a case of catarrh as I ever saw, and since he has taken one bottle of Peruna he seems like a different man.
"Taylorsville, N. C. Romulus Z. Linney."
The famous letter of Admiral Schley is a case in point. He wrote to the Peruna Company:
"I can cheerfully say that Mrs. Schley has used Peruna, and, I believe, with good effect. [Signed] W. S. Schley."
This indorsement went the rounds of the country in half-page blazonry, to the consternation of the family's friends. Admiral Schley seems to have appreciated that this use of his name was detrimental to his standing. He wrote to a Columbus religious journal the following letter: