Part 6 (1/2)
JOHN BULL.--'Tis true; yet consider my circ.u.mstances--my honour was engaged, and I did not know how to get out. Besides, I was for five years often drunk, always muddled; they carried me from tavern to tavern, to ale-houses and brandy-shops, and brought me acquainted with such strange dogs. ”There goes the prettiest fellow in the world,” says one, ”for managing a jury: make him yours. There's another can pick you up witnesses. Serjeant such-a-one has a silver tongue at the bar.”* I believe, in time I should have retained every single person within the Inns of Court. The night after a trial I treated the lawyers, their wives, and daughters, with fiddles, hautboys, drums, and trumpets. I was always hot-headed. Then they placed me in the middle, the attorneys and their clerks dancing about me, whooping and holloing, ”Long live John Bull, the glory and support of the law!”
* Hiring still more troops.
MRS. BULL.--Really, husband, you went through a very notable course.
JOHN BULL.--One of the things that first alarmed me was that they showed a spite against my poor old mother.* ”Lord,” quoth I, ”what makes you so jealous of a poor, old, innocent gentlewoman, that minds only her prayers and her Practice of Piety? She never meddles in any of your concerns.” ”Fob,” say they, ”to see a handsome, brisk, genteel young fellow so much governed by a doting old woman! Do you consider she keeps you out of a good jointure? She has the best of your estate settled upon her for a rent-charge. Hang her, old thief! turn her out of doors, seize her lands, and let her go to law if she dares.” ”Soft and fair, gentlemen,” quoth I; ”my mother's my mother, our family are not of an unnatural temper. Though I don't take all her advice, I won't seize her jointure; long may she enjoy it, good woman; I don't grudge it her. She allows me now and then a brace of hundreds for my lawsuit; that's pretty fair.” About this time the old gentlewoman fell ill of an odd sort of a distemper.**
* Railing against the Church.
** Carelessness in forms and discipline.
It began with a coldness and numbness in her limbs, which by degrees affected the nerves (I think the physicians call them), seized the brain, and at last ended in a lethargy. It betrayed itself at first in a sort of indifference and carelessness in all her actions, coldness to her best friends, and an aversion to stir or go about the common offices of life. She, that was the cleanliest creature in the world, never shrank now if you set a close-stool under her nose. She that would sometimes rattle off her servants pretty sharply, now if she saw them drink, or heard them talk profanely, never took any notice of it.
Instead of her usual charities to deserving persons, she threw away her money upon roaring, swearing bullies and beggars, that went about the streets.* ”What is the matter with the old gentlewoman?” said everybody; ”she never used to do in this manner.” At last the distemper grew more violent, and threw her downright into raving fits, in which she shrieked out so loud that she disturbed the whole neighbourhood.** In her fits she called upon one Sir William.*** ”Oh! Sir William, thou hast betrayed me, killed me, stabbed me! See, see! Clum with his b.l.o.o.d.y knife! Seize him! seize him! stop him! Behold the fury with her hissing snakes!
Where's my son John? Is he well, is he well? Poor man! I pity him!” And abundance more of such strange stuff, that n.o.body could make anything of.
* Disposing of some preferments to libertine and unprincipled persons.
** The too violent clamour about the danger of the Church.
*** Sir William, a cant name of Sir Humphry's for Lord Treasurer G.o.dolphin.
I knew little of the matter; for when I inquired about her health, the answer was that she was in a good moderate way. Physicians were sent for in haste. Sir Roger, with great difficulty, brought Ratcliff; Garth came upon the first message. There were several others called in, but, as usual upon such occasions, they differed strangely at the consultation.
At last they divided into two parties; one sided with Garth, the other with Ratcliff.* Dr. Garth said, ”This case seems to me to be plainly hysterical; the old woman is whimsical; it is a common thing for your old women to be so; I'll p.a.w.n my life, blisters, with the steel diet, will recover her.” Others suggested strong purging and letting of blood, because she was plethoric. Some went so far as to say the old woman was mad, and nothing would be better than a little corporal correction.
Ratcliff said, ”Gentlemen, you are mistaken in this case; it is plainly an acute distemper, and she cannot hold out three days unless she is supported with strong cordials.” I came into the room with a good deal of concern, and asked them what they thought of my mother? ”In no manner of danger, I vow to G.o.d,” quoth Garth; ”the old woman is hysterical, fanciful, sir, I vow to G.o.d.” ”I tell you, sir,” says Ratcliff, ”she cannot live three days to an end, unless there is some very effectual course taken with her; she has a malignant fever.” Then ”fool,” ”puppy,”
and ”blockhead,” were the best words they gave. I could hardly restrain them from throwing the ink-bottles at one another's heads. I forgot to tell you that one party of the physicians desired I would take my sister Peg into the house to nurse her, but the old gentlewoman would not hear of that. At last one physician asked if the lady had ever been used to take laudanum? Her maid answered, not that she knew; but, indeed, there was a High German liveryman of hers, one Van Ptschirnsooker,** that gave her a sort of a quack powder. The physician desired to see it. ”Nay,”
says he, ”there is opium in this, I am sure.”
* Garth, the Low Church party. Ratcliff, High Church party.
** Van Ptschirnsooker, a bishop at that time, a great dealer in politics and physic.
MRS. BULL.--I hope you examined a little into this matter?
JOHN BULL.--I did, indeed, and discovered a great mystery of iniquity.
The witnesses made oath that they had heard some of the liverymen*
frequently railing at their mistress. They said she was a troublesome fiddle-faddle old woman, and so ceremonious that there was no bearing of her. They were so plagued with bowing and cringing as they went in and out of the room that their backs ached. She used to scold at one for his dirty shoes, at another for his greasy hair and not combing his head.
Then she was so pa.s.sionate and fiery in her temper that there was no living with her. She wanted something to sweeten her blood. That they never had a quiet night's rest for getting up in the morning to early Sacraments. They wished they could find some way or another to keep the old woman quiet in her bed. Such discourses were often overheard among the liverymen, while the said Van Ptschirnsooker had undertook this matter. A maid made affidavit ”That she had seen the said Van Ptschirnsooker, one of the liverymen, frequently making up of medicines and administering them to all the neighbours; that she saw him one morning make up the powder which her mistress took; that she had the curiosity to ask him whence he had the ingredients. 'They come,' says he, 'from several parts of de world. Dis I have from Geneva, dat from Rome, this white powder from Amsterdam, and the red from Edinburgh, but the chief ingredient of all comes from Turkey.” It was likewise proved that the said Van Ptschirnsooker had been frequently seen at the ”Rose”
with Jack, who was known to bear an inveterate spite to his mistress.
That he brought a certain powder to his mistress which the examinant believes to be the same, and spoke the following words:--”Madam, here is grand secret van de world, my sweetening powder; it does temperate de humour, dispel the windt, and cure de vapour; it lulleth and quieteth the animal spirits, procuring rest and pleasant dreams. It is de infallible receipt for de scurvy, all heats in de bloodt, and breaking out upon de skin. It is de true bloodstancher, stopping all fluxes of de blood. If you do take dis, you will never ail anyding; it will cure you of all diseases.” And abundance more to this purpose, which the examinant does not remember.
* The clergy.
John Bull was interrupted in his story by a porter, that brought him a letter from Nicholas Frog, which is as follows.
CHAPTER IX.
A Copy* of Nic. Frog's Letter to John Bull.