"Babe Ruth used to wash his eyes with a special lotion before every game. Tony Lazzeri was a daily spectator at the process and openly ridiculed the Baltimore Orphan's precaution.
'Why don't you throw the stuff away, you big ape?' finally jeered Poosh 'Em Up one day. 'It doesn't do any more good than dousing your eyes with so much water. Here, give me the bottle and I'll show you.'
Before the astonished Babe could stop him Tony snatched the vial from his hands, tilted back his head and drank the entire contents. Ruth started screaming for the club doctor.
'Tony's poisoned himself!' he shouted. 'Do something, somebody. He's going to die!'
But the artful Lazzeri didn't fall, writhing, to the dressing room floor. He had substituted water for the eyewash and the laugh was on the Babe."
-Harold C. Burr in the Brooklyn Eagle (Baseball Digest, April 1953)
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