Note 18 — A BOOK FOR A RAINY DAY

This famous aid to the teething of children was invented about the year 1717, when there appeared a Philosophical Essay upon the Celebrated Anodyne Necklace, dedicated to Dr. Paul Chamberlen (who died in this year), and the Royal Society. This tract, quoted by Mr. J. Eliot Hodgkin in Notes and Queries of Feb. 16, 1884, argues the advantages of the necklace as follows:—

“For since the difficult Cutting of Children’s Teeth proceeds from the hard and strict Closure of their Gums; If you get Them but once separated and opened, the Teeth will of themselves Naturally come Forth; Now the Smooth Alcalious Atoms of the Necklace, by their insinuating figure and shape, do so make way for their Protrusion by gently softening and opening the hard swelled Gums, that the Teeth will of themselves without any difficulty or pain Cut and come out, as has been sufficiently proved.”

Mr. Hodgkin describes the necklace as “of beads artificially prepared, small, like barley-corns,” costing five shillings. An early depôt was Garraway’s at the Royal Exchange Gate. In Smith’s day they were sold in Long Acre by Mr. Burchell at the sign of the Anodyne Necklace, and the price was still “5s. single,” with “an allowance by the dozen to sell again.” Burchell advertised: “After the Wearing of which about their Neck but One night, Children have immediately cut their Teeth with Safety, who but just before were on the Brink of the Grave.”