Part 25 (1/2)
”The Lord bless your honour--yes,” whined Molly.
To get beyond the reach of her miserable voice the Doctor ran to his horse, and rode off to Woodbridge. At night as he returned, he stopped at the cottage to inquire after the sick man.
”He's bin took away, yer honour,” said the woman, as the physician entered. ”The water didn't fare to do him noan good--noan in the lessest, sir. Only then we couldn't get down the right quant.i.ty, though we did our best. We got down better nor a pail and a half, when he slipped out o' our hands. Ah, yer honour! if we could but ha'
got him to swaller the rest, he might still be alive! But we did our best, Doctor!”
Clumsy empirics, however, as the Taylors were, they attended people of the first importance. The elder Taylor was called to London to attend Thurlow, Bishop of Durham, the brother of Lord Chancellor Thurlow. The representative men of the Faculty received him at the bishop's residence, but he would not commence the consultation till the arrival of John Hunter. ”I won't say a word till Jack Hunter comes,” roared the Whitworth doctor; ”he's the only man of you who knows anything.”
When Hunter arrived, Taylor proceeded to his examination of the bishop's state, and, in the course of it, used some ointment which he took from a box.
”What's it made of?” Hunter asked.
”That's not a fair question,” said Taylor, turning to the Lord Chancellor, who happened to be present. ”No, no, Jack. I'll send you as much as you please, but I won't tell you what it's made of.”
CHAPTER XXI.
ST. JOHN LONG.
In the entire history of charlatanism, however, it would be difficult to point to a career more extraordinary than the brilliant though brief one of St. John Long, in our own cultivated London, at a time scarcely more than a generation distant from the present. Though a pretender, and consummate quack, he was distinguished from the vulgar herd of cheats by the possession of enviable personal endowments, a good address, and a considerable quant.i.ty of intellect. The son of an Irish basket-maker, he was born in or near Doneraile, and in his boyhood a.s.sisted in his father's humble business. His artistic talents, which he cultivated for some time without the aid of a drawing-master, enabled him, while still quite a lad, to discontinue working as a rush-weaver. For a little while he stayed at Dublin, and had some intercourse with Daniel Richardson the painter; after which he moved to Limerick county, and started on his own account as a portrait-painter, and an instructor in the use of the brush. That his education was not superior to what might be expected in a clever youth of such lowly extraction, the following advertis.e.m.e.nt, copied from a Limerick paper of February 10, 1821, attests:--
”Mr John Saint John Long, Historical and Portrait Painter, the only pupil of Daniel Richardson, Esq., late of Dublin, proposes, during his stay in Limerick, to take portraits from Ittalian Head to whole length; and parson desirous of getting theirs done, in historical, hunting, shooting, fis.h.i.+ng, or any other character; or their family, grouped in one or two paintings from life-size to miniature, so as to make an historical subject, choseing one from history.”
”The costume of the period from whence it would be taken will be particularly attended to, and the character of each proserved.”
”He would take views in the country, terms per agreement. Specimens to be seen at his Residence, No. 116, Georges Street, opposite the Club-house, and at Mr James Dodds, Paper-staining Warehouse, Georges Street.
”Mr Long is advised by his several friends to give instructions in the Art of Painting in Oils, Opeak, Chalk, and Water-colours, &c., to a limited number of Pupils of Respectability two days in each week at stated hours.”
”Gentlemen are not to attend at the same hour the Ladies attend at. He will supply them in water-colours, &c.”
How the young artist acquired the name of St. John is a mystery. When he blazed into notoriety, his admirers a.s.serted that it came to him in company with n.o.ble blood that ran in his veins; but more unkind observers declared that it was a.s.sumed, as being likely to tickle the ears of his credulous adherents. His success as a provincial art-professor was considerable. The gentry of Limerick liked his manly bearing and lively conversation, and invited him to their houses to take likenesses of their wives, flirt with their daughters, and accompany their sons on hunting and shooting excursions. Emboldened by good luck in his own country, and possibly finding the patronage of the impoverished aristocracy of an Irish province did not yield him a sufficient income, he determined to try his fortune in England. Acting on this resolve, he hastened to London, and with ingratiating manners and that persuasive tongue which nine Irishmen out of ten possess, he managed to get introductions to a few respectable drawing-rooms. He even obtained some employment from Sir Thomas Lawrence, as colour-grinder and useful a.s.sistant in the studio; and was elected a member of the Royal Society of Literature, and also of the Royal Asiatic Society. But like many an Irish adventurer, before and after him, he found it hard work to live on his impudence, pleasant manners, and slender professional acquirements. He was glad to colour anatomical drawings for the professors and pupils of one of the minor surgical schools of London; and in doing so picked up a few pounds and a very slight knowledge of the structure of the human frame. The information so obtained stimulated him to further researches, and, ere a few more months of starvation had pa.s.sed over, he deemed himself qualified to cure all the bodily ailments to which the children of Adam are subject.
He invented a lotion or liniment endowed with the remarkable faculty of distinguis.h.i.+ng between sound and unsound tissues. To a healthy part it was as innocuous as water; but when applied to a surface under which any seeds of disease were lurking, it became a violent irritant, creating a sore over the seat of mischief, and stimulating nature to throw off the morbid virus. He also instructed his patients to inhale the vapour which rose from a certain mixture compounded by him in large quant.i.ties, and placed in the interior of a large mahogany case, which very much resembled an upright piano. In the sides of this piece of furniture were apertures, into which pipe-stalks were screwed for the benefit of afflicted mortals, who, sitting on easy lounges, smoked away like a party of Turkish elders.
With these two agents St. John Long engaged to combat every form of disease--gout, palsy, obstructions of the liver, cutaneous affections; but the malady which he professed to have the most complete command over was consumption. His success in surrounding himself with patients was equal to his audacity. He took a large house in Harley Street, and fitted it up for the reception of people anxious to consult him; and for some seasons every morning and afternoon (from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.) the public way was blocked up with carriages pressing to his door. The old and the young alike flocked to him; but nine of his patients out of every ten were ladies. For awhile the foolish of every rank in London seemed to have but one form in which to display their folly.
Needy matrons from obscure suburban villages came with their guineas to consult the new oracle; and ladies of the highest rank, fas.h.i.+on, and wealth, hastened to place themselves and their daughters at the mercy of a pretender's ignorance.
Unparalleled were the scenes which the reception-rooms of that notorious house in Harley Street witnessed. In one room were two enormous inhalers, with flexible tubes running outwards in all directions, and surrounded by dozens of excited women--ladies of advanced years, and young girls giddy with the excitement of their first London season--puffing from their lips the medicated vapour, or waiting till a mouth-piece should be at liberty for their pink lips.
In another room the great magician received his patients. Some he ordered to persevere in inhalation, others he divested of their raiment, and rubbed his miraculous liniment into their backs, between their shoulders or over their bosoms. Strange to say, these lavations and frictions--which invariably took place in the presence of third persons, nurses or invalids--had very different results. The fluid, which, as far as the eye could discern, was taken out of the same vessel, and was the same for all, would instantaneously produce on one lady a burning excoriation, which had in due course to be dressed with cabbage-leaves; but on another would be so powerless that she could wash in it, or drink it copiously, like ordinary pump-water, with impunity. ”Yes,” said the wizard, ”that was his system, and such were its effects. If a girl had tubercles in her lungs, the lotion applied to the outward surface of her chest would produce a sore, and extract the virus from the organs of respiration. If a gentleman had a gouty foot, and washed it in this new water of Jordan, at the cost of a little temporary irritation the vicious particles would leave the affected part. But on any sound person who bathed in it the fluid would have no power whatever.”
The news of the wonderful remedy flew to every part of the kingdom; and from every quarter sick persons, wearied of a vain search after an alleviation of their sufferings, flocked to London with hope renewed once more. St. John Long had so many applicants for attention that he was literally unable to give heed to all of them; and he availed himself of this excess of business to select for treatment those cases only where there seemed every chance of a satisfactory result. In this he was perfectly candid, for time after time he declared that he would take no one under his care who seemed to have already gone beyond hope. On one occasion he was called into the country to see a gentleman who was in the last stage of consumption; and after a brief examination of the poor fellow's condition, he said frankly--
”Sir, you are so ill that I cannot take you under my charge at present. You want stamina. Take hearty meals of beefsteaks and strong beer; and if you are better in ten days, I'll do my best for you and cure you.”
It was a safe offer to make, for the sick man lived little more than forty-eight hours longer.
But, notwithstanding the calls of his enormous practice, St. John Long found time to enjoy himself. He went a great deal into fas.h.i.+onable society, and was petted by the great and high-born, not only because he was a notoriety, but because of his easy manners, imposing carriage, musical though hesitating voice, and agreeable disposition.
He was tall and slight, but strongly built; and his countenance, thin and firmly set, although frank in expression, caused beholders to think highly of his intellectual refinement, as well as of his decision and energy. Possibly his personal advantages had no slight influence with his feminine applauders. But he possessed other qualities yet more fitted to secure their esteem--an Irish impetuosity of temperament and a sincere sympathy with the unfortunate. He was an excellent horseman, hunting regularly, and riding superb horses. On one occasion, as he was cantering round the Park, he saw a man strike a woman, and without an instant's consideration he pulled up, leaped to the ground, seized the fellow bodily, and with one enormous effort flung him slap over the Park rails.
But horse-exercise was the only masculine pastime he was very fond of.