The Funny Side of Physic Part 74

"_Except drinking and eating_, my lord."

The council retired, greatly disappointed, for they had expected to worm some important secret from the doctor.

At Finch Lane Tavern, where Dr. Beauford used to receive the apothecaries at half fee, he was represented as sitting over his bottles and gla.s.ses, from which he drank deeply, never offering one of his clients a drop, though they often sat opposite, at the same table, looking with anxious countenances and watering mouths upon the tempting cordials, as the doctor tossed them off.

"DOORN'T GO TO 'IM," ETC.

"Not many years since, in a fis.h.i.+ng village on the eastern coast, there flourished a doctor in great repute amongst the poor, and his influence over the humble patients literally depended on the fact that he was sure, once in the twenty-four hours, to be handsomely intoxicated.

"d.i.c.kens has told us how, when he bought the raven immortalized in 'Barnaby Rudge,' the vender of that sagacious bird, after enumerating his various accomplishments, said, in conclusion,--

"'But, sir, if you want him to come out strong, you must show him a man drunk.'

"The simple villagers of Flintbeach had a firm faith in the strengthening effect of looking at a tipsy doctor. They usually postponed their visits to Dr. Mutchkins till evening, because they then had the benefit of the learned man in his highest intellectual condition.

"'Doorn't go to 'im i' the morning; he can't doctor no ways to speak on till he's had a gla.s.s,' was the advice usually given to strangers not aware of the doctor's little peculiarities."

DR. BUTLER'S BEER AND BATH.

An amusing description is given of one Dr. Butler, of London, who, like the above, used to get drunk nightly. He was the inventor of a beer which bore his name, something like our Ottawa, "with a stick in it," by one Dr.

Irish. We once saw a drunken fellow holding on to a lamp post, while he held out one hand, and was arguing with an imaginary policeman that he was not drunk,--only had been taking a "little of that--hic--beverage, Dr.

Waterwa's Irish beer, by the advice of his physician."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "ONLY IRISH BEER."]

Dr. Butler had an old female servant named Nell Boler. At ten o'clock, nightly, she used to go to the tavern where the doctor was, by that hour, too drunk to go home alone, when, after some argument and a deal of scolding from Nell for his "beastly drunkenness," she would carry the inebriated doctor home, and put him to bed.

"Notwithstanding that Dr. Butler was fond of beer and wine for himself, he was said to approve of water for his patients. Once he occupied rooms bordering on the Thames. A gentleman afflicted by the ague came to see him. Butler tipped the wink to his a.s.sistant, who tumbled the invalid out of the window, slap into the river. We are asked to believe that the surprise actually cured the patient of his disease."

[Ill.u.s.tration: CURE FOR THE AGUE.]

Water did not cure the doctor, however, but beer did.

Dr. Burrowly was stricken down in his prime, and just as he was about to succeed to the most elevated position in the medical profession.

The doctor was a politician, as well as an excellent surgeon. When Lords Gower and Vandeput were contesting the election for Westminster, in 1780, the doctor was supporting the latter. One Weatherly, who kept a tavern, and whose wife wore the ---- belt, was very sick. Mrs. Weatherly deeply regretted the fact of the sickness, as she wanted her husband to vote for Lord T. Late on election day, Dr. Burrowly called round to see his patient, quite willing that he should be sufficiently sick to keep him from going to the polls. To his surprise he found him up, and dressed.

"Heyday! how's this?" exclaimed the doctor, in anger. "Why are you up, without my permission?"

"O, doctor," replied Joe Weatherly, feebly, "I am going to vote."

"Vote!" roared the doctor, not doubting that his wife had urged him to attempt to go to the polls to vote for Lord J. "To bed. The cold air would kill you. To bed instantly, or you're a dead man before nightfall."

"I'll do as you say, doctor; but as my wife was away, I thought I could get as far as Covent Garden Church, and vote for Sir George Vandeput."

"For Sir George, did you say, Joe?"

"O, yes, sir; I don't agree with my wife. She's for Lord Trentham."

The doctor changed his prognosis.

"Wait. Let me see; nurse, don't remove his stockings;" feeling the man's pulse. "Humph! A good firm stroke. Better than I expected. You took the pills? Yes; they made you sick? Nurse, did he sleep well?"

"Charmingly, sir;" with a knowing twinkle of the eye.

"Well, Joe, if you are bent on going to the polls, it will set your mind better at ease to go. It's a fine sunny afternoon. The ride will do you good. So, bedad, I'll take you along in my chariot."

Weatherly was delighted with the doctor's urbanity, resumed his coat, went to the election, and voted for Sir George, rode back in the chariot, _and died two hours afterwards_, amidst the reproaches of his amiable spouse.

"Called away from a dinner table, where he was eating, laughing, and drinking deeply, Dr. B. was found dead in the coach from apoplexy, on the arrival at the place of destination."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

XXIII.

THE DOCTOR AS POET, AUTHOR, AND MUSICIAN.

"Here comes the trout that must be caught with tickling."

"To patient study, and unwearied thought, And wise and watchful nurture of his powers, Must the true poet consecrate his hours: Thus, and thus only, may the crown be bought Which his great brethren all their lives have sought; For not to careless wreathers of chance-flowers Openeth the Muse her amaranthine bowers, But to the few, who worthily have fought The toilsome fight, and won their way to fame.

With such as these I may not cast my lot, With such as these I must not seek a name; Content to please a while and be forgot; Winning from daily toil--which irks me not-- Rare and brief leisure my poor song to frame."

OUR PATRON, OUR PATTERN.--SOME WRITERS.--SOME BLUNDERS.--AN OLD SMOKER.--OLD GREEKS.--A DUKE ANSWERED BY A COUNTRY MISS.--THE PILGRIMS AND THE PEAS.--"LITTLE DAISY."--"CASA WAPPA!"--FINE POETRY.--MORE SCHOOLMASTERS AND TAILORS.--NAPOLEON'S AND WAs.h.i.+NGTON'S PHYSICIANS.--A FRENCH "BUTCHER."--A DIF. OF OPINION.--SOME EPITAPHS.--DR. HOLMES'

"ONE-HOSS SHAY."--HEALTHFUL INFLUENCE OF MUSIC.--SAVED BY MUSIC.--A GERMAN TOUCH-UP.--MUSIC ON ANIMALS.--MUSIC AMONG THE MICE.--MUSIC AND HEALTH.

Apollo,--the father of aesculapius, the "father of physicians"--was the G.o.d of poetry and of music, as well as the patron of physicians. He presented to Mercurius the famous caduceus, which has descended in the semblance of the shepherd's crook--he being the protector of shepherds and the Muses--and the physician's cane and surgeon's pole. Apollo is represented with flowing hair,--which the Romans loved to imitate, with an effort also at his graces of person and mind. Students at this day who court the Muses begin by allowing, or coaxing their hair to grow long, forgetting, as they nurse a sickly goatee or mustache, a.s.sisting its show by an occasional dose of nitrate of silver, that their G.o.d was further represented as a tall, _beardless_ youth, and instead of a bottle or cigar, he held a lyre in his hand and discoursed music.

[Ill.u.s.tration: AN EMBRYO APOLLO.]

I think Dr. Apollo a very safe pattern for our students to imitate, those particularly who are "fast," and who only think, with _Bobby Burns_,--

"Just now we're living sound and hale; Then top and maintop crowd the sail; Heave care owre side!

And large, before enjoyment's gale, Let's tak the tide."

It is quite impossible to mention all, even of the most celebrated of our physicians, who have contributed to the literary and musical world. But I shall quote a sufficient number to disprove the a.s.sertion that "literary physicians have not, as a rule, prospered as medical pract.i.tioners."

Who has developed and promulgated the knowledge relative to anatomy, chemistry, physiology, botany, etc., but the physicians? The true representation of sculpture, of painting, of engraving, and most of the arts, depends upon the learned writing of the doctors.

Da Vinci owed his success as a portrait painter to his knowledge of anatomy and physiology derived from study under a physician, as also did Michael Angelo. How would our Powers have succeeded as a sculptor, without this knowledge, or Miss Bonheur as a painter of animals? Dr. Hunter says "Vinci (L.) was at the time the best anatomist in the world."

Crabbe, to be sure, failed as a physician, but succeeded as a literary man; but then Crabbe was no physician, and was unread in medicine and surgery. Arbuthnot also failed in the same manner, and for the same cause.

All who have so failed may attribute it to the fact they _did not succeed in what they were not, but did succeed in what they were_--as Oliver Goldsmith. He squandered at the gaming table the money given him by his kind uncle to get him through Trinity College, and though spending two years afterwards in Edinburgh, and pa.s.sing one year at Leyden, ostensibly reading medicine, he totally failed to pa.s.s an examination before the surgeons of the college at London, and was rejected "as being insufficiently informed." He had previously been writing for the unappreciative booksellers, and authors.h.i.+p now became, per force, his only means of livelihood.