Slave to the Quinine Habit.

A tall, fine looking woman, dressed in the latest fashion, entered an uptown drug store the other evening, and, approaching the counter, leaned wearily against it. The clerk, who was waiting on another customer, reached to a shelf, and taking down a little box shook three pills into a bit of paper. He passed them to the fashionable lady and gave her a glass of mineral water. After putting the pills in her mouth the lady drank the water and with a sigh of relief hurried from the shop. Not a word passed between either customer or clerk, and no money was paid for the pills.

“Well, that beats me,” exclaimed a visitor.

“It is rather singular,” said the clerk, smiling, “but such things happen here every day. That customer is well known in the social world. She has got the quinine habit, which will kill her in the end. There is too much of the this quinine business going on, but we have to keep up with the time. That lady exhausted herself in social and charitable visits, and then began tot ake a five grain pill of quinine to brace up on. She did it by the advice of a friend. From five grains every evening she advanced to fifteen, and soon she will want twenty. She likes to feel cheerful and look well when she foes out with her husband, and, having become a slave to quinine, she takes it as a stimulant, but her husband is ignorant of the habit. She pays us $1.50 per week, and we keep the pills here for her. it is far worse than drinking alcoholic liquor and we frequently advise our quinine patients to brace up on whisky or brandy, and let quinine alone.” – New York Telegram

source: The Indiana Progress
location: Indiana, Pennsylvania