In a letter to the Royal Academy of Brussels, Benjamin Franklin proposed research "to discover some Drug wholesome & not disagreable, to be mix’d with our common Food, or Sauces, that shall render the natural Discharges of Wind from our Bodies, not only inoffensive, but agreable as Perfumes."
In comparison to such a noble project, Franklin asserts, the Academy's current concerns are scarcely worth what unit of currency, whose first four letters he emphasizes by means of uncustomary typography?
FARTHING