When the doctor called that day, he found, sitting beside the little
patient's pillow, a white-faced clown, who kept him in a constant ripple
of laughter, and who was observing, as he stirred a lump of sugar at the
bottom of a glass of cooling drink:
"You know, Francis, if you do not drink your medicine, you will never
see Slap-bang again."
And the child drank up the draught.
"Is it not good?"
"Very good. Thank you, Slap-bang."
[Illustration: "THANK YOU, SLAP-BANG."]
"Doctor," said the clown to the physician, "do not be jealous, but it
seems to me that my tomfooleries have done more good than your
prescriptions."
The poor parents were both crying; but this time it was with joy.
From that time till little Francis was on foot again, a carriage pulled
up every day before the lodging of the workman in the Rue des Abbesses;
a man descended, wrapped in a greatcoat with the collar turned up to his
ears, and underneath arrayed as for the circus, with his gay visage
white with flour.
"What do I owe you, sir?" said Jacques to the good clown, on the day
when Francis left the house for the first time. "For I really owe you
everything!"
The clown extended to the parents his two hands, huge as those of
Hercules:
"A shake of the hand," he said. Then, kissing the little boy on both his
rosy cheeks, he added, laughing, "And permission to inscribe on my
visiting-cards, 'Slap-bang, doctor-acrobat, physician in ordinary to
little Francis!'"
[Illustration]
_Portraits of Celebrities at different times of their Lives._
[Illustration: AGE 4. _From a Miniature._]
[Illustration: AGE 36. _From a Painting by G. Richmond, R.A._]
[Illustration: AGE 81. _From a Photo by Messrs. Elliott & Fry._]