第75章

IN the narrative of home events I skipped a little business, not quite colourless, but irrelevant to the love passages then on hand. It has, however, a connection with the curious events now converging to a point:

so, with the reader's permission, I will place it in logical sequence, disregarding the order of time. The day Dr. Sampson splashed among the ducks, and one of them hid till dinner, the rest were seated at luncheon, when two patients were announced as waiting--Mr. and Mrs. Maxley. Sampson refused to see them, on this ground: "I will not feed and heal." But Mrs.

Dodd interceded, and he yielded. "Well, then, show them in here. They are better cracters than pashints." On this, a stout fresh-coloured woman, the picture of health, was ushered in and curtseyed all round. "Well, what is the matter now?" inquired Sampson rather roughly. "Be seated, Mrs. Maxley," said Mrs. Dodd, benignly.

"I thank ye kindly, ma'am;" and she sat down. "Doctor, it is that pain.""Well, don't say 'that pain.' Describe it. Now listen all of ye; ye're goen to get a clinical lecture.""If _you_ please, ma'am," said the patient, "it takes me here under my left breest, and runs right to my elbow, it do; and bitter bad 'tis while it do last; chokes me mostly; and I feel as I must die: and if I was to move hand or fut, I think I _should_ die, that I do.""Poor woman!" said Mrs. Dodd.

"Oh, she isn't dead yet," cried Sampson cheerfully. "She'll sell addled eggs over all our tombstones; that is to say, if she minds what I bid her. When was your last spasm?""No longer agone that yestereen, ma'am; and so I said to my master, 'The doctor he is due to-morrow, Sally up at Albion tells me; and----'""Whist! whist! who cares what you said to Jack, and Jill said to you?

What was the cause?"

"The cause! What, of my pain? He says, 'What was the cause?'""Ay, the cause. Just obsairve, jintlemen," said Sampson, addressing imaginary students, "how startled they all are if a docker deviates from profissional habits into sceince, and takes the right eend of the stick for once b' asking for the cause.""The cause was the will of God, I do suppose," said Mrs. Maxley.

"Stuff!" shouted Sampson angrily. "Then why come to mortal me to cure you?"Alfred put in his oar. "He does not mean the 'final cause;' he means the 'proximate cause.

"My poor dear creature, I bain't no Latiner," objected the patient.

Sampson fixed his eyes sternly on the slippery dame. "What I want to know is, had you been running up-stairs? or eating fast? or drinking fast? or grizzling over twopence? or quarrelling with your husband! Come now, which was it?""Me quarrel with my man! We haven't never been disagreeable, not once, since we went to church a pair and came back a couple. I don't say but what we mayn't have had a word or two at odd times, as married folk will.""And the last time you had a word or two--y' infairnal quibbler--was it just before your last spasm, eh?""Well, it might; I am not gainsaying that: but you said quarrel, says you. 'Quarrel' it were your word; and I defy all Barkton, gentle and simple, to say as how me and my master----""Whisht! whisht! Now, jintlemen, ye see what the great coming sceince--the sceince of Healing--has to contind with. The dox are all fools, but one: and the pashints are lyres, ivery man Jack. N' listen me;y' have got a disease that you can't eradicate; but you may muzzle it for years, and die of something quite different when your time's up.""Like enough, sir. If _you_ please, ma'am, Dr. Stephenson do blame my indigestion for it.""Dr. Stephenson's an ass.""Dear heart, how cantankerous you be. To be sure Dr. Osmond he says no:

it's muscular, says he."

"Dr. Osmond's an ijjit. List me; You mustn't grizzle about money; you mustn't gobble, nor drink your beer too fast.""You are wrong, doctor; I never drink no beer: it costs----""Your catlap, then. And above all, no grizzling! Go to church whenever you can without losing a farthing. It's medicinal; soothes the brain, and takes it off worldly cares. And have no words with your husband, or he'll outlive you; it's his only chance of getting the last word. Care killed a cat, a nanimal with eight lives more than a chatterbox. If you worry or excite your brain, little Maxley, you will cook your own goose--by a quick fire.""Dear heart, these be unked sayings. Won't ye give me nothing to make me better, sir?""No, I never tinker; I go to the root: you may buy a vile of chlorofm and take a puff if you feel premonory symps: but a quiet brain is your only real chance. Now slope, and send the male screw.""Anan?""Your husband."

"That I will, sir. Your sarvant, doctor; your sarvant, ma'am; sarvant, all the company.

Mrs. Dodd hoped the poor woman had nothing very serious the matter.

"Oh, it is a mortal disease," replied Sampson, as cool as a cucumber.

"She has got angina pictoris or brist-pang, a disorder that admirably eximplifies the pretinsions of midicine t' seeince." And with this he dashed into monologue.

Maxley's tall gaunt form came slouching in, and traversed the floor, pounding it with heavy nailed boots. He seated himself gravely at Mrs.

Dodd's invitation, took a handkerchief out of his hat, wiped his face, and surveyed the company, grand and calm. In James Maxley all was ponderous: his head was huge, his mouth, when it fairly opened, revealed a chasm, and thence issued a voice naturally stentorian by its volume and native vigour; but, when the owner of this incarnate bassoon had a mind to say something sagacious, he sank at once from his habitual roar to a sound scarce above a whisper; a contrast mighty comical to hear, though on paper _nil._"Well, what is it Maxley! Rheumatism again?""No, that it ain't," bellowed Maxley defiantly.

"What then? Come, look sharp."

"Well, then, doctor, I'll tell you. I'm sore troubled--with--a--mouse."This malady, announced in the tone of a proclamation, and coming after so much solemn preparation, amused the party considerably, although parturient mountains had ere then produced muscipular abortions.