The Fortunes Of Glencore. Charles James Lever

“He might have perceived that I did n't come in a coach; that I had n't my hair powdered, nor gold knee-buckles in my smallcloths; but, for all that, it would be going too far to say that I was n't a doctor! 'T is the same with physic and poetry—you take to it, or you don't take to it! There's chaps, ay, and far from stupid ones either, that could n't compose you ten hexameters if ye'd put them on a hot griddle for it; and there's others that would talk rhyme rather than rayson! And so with the ars medicatrix—everybody has n't an eye for a hectic, or an ear for a cough—non contigit cuique adire Corintheum. 'T is n't every one can toss pancakes, as Horace says.”

      “Hush—be still!” muttered Craggs, “here's the young master.” And as he spoke, a youth of about fifteen, well grown and handsome, but poorly, even meanly clad, approached them.

      “Have you seen my father? What do you think of him?” asked he, eagerly.

      “'Tis a critical state he's in, your honor,” said Billy, bowing; “but I think he 'll come round—deplation, deplation, deplation—actio, actio, actio; relieve the gorged vessels, and don't drown the grand hydraulic machine, the heart—them's my sentiments.”

      Turning from the speaker with a look of angry impatience, the boy whispered some words in the Corporal's ear.

      “What could I do, sir?” was the answer; “it was this fellow or nothing.”

      “And better, a thousand times better, nothing,” said the boy, “than trust his life to the coarse ignorance of this wretched quack.” And in his passion the words were uttered loud enough for Billy to overhear them.

      “Don't be hasty, your honor,” said Billy, submissively, “and don't be unjust. The realms of disaze is like an unknown tract of country, or a country that's only known a little, just round the coast, as it might be; once ye're beyond that, one man is as good a guide as another, coeteris paribus, that is, with 'equal lights.'”

      “What have you done? Have you given him anything?” broke in the boy, hurriedly.

      “I took a bleeding from him, little short of sixteen ounces, from the temporial,” said Billy, proudly, “and I'll give him now a concoction of meadow saffron with a pinch of saltpetre in it, to cause diaphoresis, d'ye mind? Meanwhile, we're disgorging the arachnoid membranes with cowld applications, and we're relievin' the cerebellum by repose. I challenge the Hall,” added Billy, stoutly, “to say is n't them the grand principles of 'traitment.' Ah! young gentleman,” said he, after a few seconds' pause, “don't be hard on me, because I 'm poor and in rags, nor think manely of me because I spake with a brogue, and maybe bad grammar, for, you see, even a crayture of my kind can have a knowledge of disaze, just as he may have a knowledge of nature, by observation. What is sickness, after all, but just one of the phenomenons of all organic and inorganic matter—a regular sort of shindy in a man's inside, like a thunderstorm, or a hurry-cane outside? Watch what's coming, look out and see which way the mischief is brewin', and make your preparations. That's the great study of physic.”

      The boy listened patiently and even attentively to this speech, and when Billy had concluded, he turned to the Corporal and said, “Look to him, Craggs, and let him have his supper, and when he has eaten it send him to my room.”

      Billy bowed an acknowledgment, and followed the Corporal to the kitchen.

      “That's my lord's son, I suppose,” said he, as he seated himself, “and a fine young crayture too—puer ingenuus, with a grand frontal development.” And with this reflection he addressed himself to the coarse but abundant fare which Craggs placed before him, and with an appetite that showed how much he relished it.

      “This is elegant living ye have here, Mr. Craggs,” said Billy, as he drained his tankard of beer, and placed it with a sigh on the table; “many happy years of it to ye—I could n't wish ye anything better.”

      “The life is not so bad,” said Craggs, “but it's lonely sometimes.”

      “Life need never be lonely so long as a man has health and his faculties,” said Billy; “give me nature to admire, a bit of baycon for dinner, and my fiddle to amuse me, and I would n't change with the King of Sugar 'Candy.'”

      “I was there,” said Craggs, “it's a fine island.”

      “My lord wants to see the doctor,” said a woman, entering hastily.

      “And the doctor is ready for him,” said Billy, rising and leaving the kitchen with all the dignity he could assume.

CHAPTER III. BILLY TRAYNOR—POET, PEDLAR, AND PHYSICIAN

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      “Didn't I tell you how it would be?” said Billy, as he re-entered the kitchen, now crowded by the workpeople, anxious for tidings of the sick man. “The head is re-leaved, the congestive symptoms is allayed, and when the artarial excitement subsides, he 'll be out of danger.”

      “Musha, but I 'm glad,” muttered one; “he 'd be a great loss to us.”

      “True for you, Patsey; there's eight or nine of us here would miss him if he was gone.”

      “Troth, he doesn't give much employment, but we couldn't spare him,” croaked out a third, when the entrance of the Corporal cut short further commentary; and the party gathered around the cheerful turf fire with that instinctive sense of comfort impressed by the swooping wind and rain that beat against the windows.

      “It's a dreadful night outside; I would n't like to cross the lough in it,” said one.

      “Then that's just what I'm thinking of this minit,” said Billy. “I'll have to be up at the office for the bags at six o'clock.”

      “Faix, you 'll not see Leenane at six o'clock to-morrow.”

      “Sorra taste of it,” muttered another; “there's a sea runnin' outside now that would swamp a life-boat.”

      “I'll not lose an illigant situation of six pounds ten a year, and a pair of shoes at Christmas, for want of a bit of courage,” said Billy; “I'd have my dismissal if I wasn't there as sure as my name is Billy Traynor.”

      “And better for you than lose your life, Billy,” said one.

      “And it's not alone myself I'd be thinking of,” said Billy; “but every man in this world, high and low, has his duties. My duty,” added he, somewhat pretentiously, “is to carry the King's mail; and if anything was to obstruckt, or impade, or delay the correspondience, it's on me the blame would lie.”

      “The letters wouldn't go the faster because you were drowned,” broke in the Corporal.

      “No, sir,” said Billy, rather staggered by the grin of approval that met this remark—“no, sir, what you ob-sarve is true; but nobody reflects on the sintry that dies at his post.”

      “If you must and will go, I'll give you the yawl,” said Craggs; “and I 'll go with you myself.”

      “Spoke like a British Grenadier,” cried Billy, with enthusiasm.

      “Carbineer, if the same to you, master,” said the other, quietly; “I never served in the infantry.”

      “Tros Tyriusve mihi,” cried Billy; “which is as much as to say—

      “'To storm the skies, or lay siege to the moon,

      Give me one of the line, or a heavy dragoon,'

      it's the same to me, as the poet says.”

      And a low murmur of the company seemed to accord approval to the sentiment.

      “I wish you 'd give us a tune, Billy,” said one, coaxingly.

      “Or a song