From the Memoirs of Joshua Frampton, Esq., late Honorary Physician to
the Wells, and Surgeon.
I cannot pass this year 1790 without speaking of a ridiculous
adventure which, but that it providentially happened at the close of
our season, when the Spa was emptying and our fashionables talked
more of packing their trunks than of the newest scandals, might have
done me some professional damage besides bringing unmerited public
laughter upon the heads of two honest gentlemen. As it was, our
leading news-sheet, the _Hotwells Courant_, did not even smoke the
affair, and so lost a nine days' wonder; while the Whig _Examiner_,
after printing an item which threw me into a two days' perspiration,
forbore to follow up the scent--the reason being that Mr. Lemoine,
its editor, was shortly expecting an addition to his family, and,
knowing his nervousness upon these occasions and his singular
confidence in my skill, I was able to engage him by arguments to
which at another time he might have listened less amiably.
I have already related how, on the approach of autumn, I advertised
for an assistant. The young man whom I selected was a Scotsman from
the University of Glasgow, Duncan MacRea by name, and no youth of his
age could have brought better testimonials to ability or character.
Relying upon these, I did not stand out for an interview--his home
lying so far away as Largs, in Ayrshire--but came to terms at once,
and he arrived at my door with his valise at the untimely hour of
five in the morning, the fifteenth of October, having travelled all
the way to Bristol in a ship laden with salted herrings.
I will own that this apparition on my doorstep in the cold
morning light (he had rung the night-bell) surprised me somewhat.
But I remembered the proverbial impetuosity of Scotsmen in pushing
their fortunes, and his personal appearance may have helped to
conciliate me, since my mind had misgiven me that I had done wiser to
insist on an interview, instead of buying a pig in a poke; for looks
no less than knowledge are a physician's _passepartout_ among the
ladies who bring their ailments to our provincial spas. The face
which the lad lifted towards my bedroom window was a remarkably
handsome one, though pallid, and the voice in which he answered my
challenge had a foreign intonation, but musical and in no way
resembling the brogue for which I had been preparing myself.
So delighted was I at this dissipation of my fears that, slipping on
my dressing-gown (I believe without removing my nightcap), and
pausing only on the landing to call up to the maidservants to light a
fire and prepare coffee with all speed, I hurried downstairs and
unbarred the door. Whereupon Master MacRea instantly and with great
cordiality shook me by the hand.
"It is a great pleasure to me, Dr. Frampton, to make your
acquaintance, more especially, sir, to find you surrounded by those
evidences of a prosperous practice which I had indeed inferred from
your genteel reticence and the quality of your notepaper. At the end
of a long journey, undertaken on the strength of that inference, it
is delightful to find my best hopes confirmed."
He shook me by the hand again very warmly. Taken aback by this
extraordinary address, I gasped once or twice, and even then could
find nothing better to say than that he must have found his journey
fatiguing.
"Fatiguing, perhaps, but not tiresome. To the philosophic mind,
Dr. Frampton, there should be no such thing as tedium, boredom,
_ennui_, and I trust that mine is philosophic. You were much in my
thoughts, sir, between the attacks of sea-sickness. By frequent
perusal I had committed your two epistles to memory, and while
silently rehearsing their well-turned sentences, in the words of
Dr. Samuel Johnson I pursued in imagination the pleasures of hope,
yet without listening to the whispers of credulity--for I was
prepared to find your flattering description fade upon a nearer
prospect. But I am reassured!"
Positively he shook hands for a third time. Confound the fellow!
I had merely hinted that my patients, or the most of them, were of
good social position, and had offered him board and lodging, with a
salary of forty pounds, rising five pounds annually.
"And by Heavens!" he exclaimed, spinning round on his heel at a sound
of hasty footsteps crossing the square, "here comes fresh
confirmation! A black manservant--and, as I live, in a gold-laced
hat! Of such things I have read in books, but how much livelier,
Dr. Frampton, is the ocular appeal of reality!"
It was, to be sure, Major Dignum's black valet Gumbo, and with a note
for me. The fellow's disordered dress and quick breathing spoke of
urgency, and I broke the seal at once, wondering the while what could
have befallen the Major, a retired and gouty West Indian whom I had
been visiting daily for three months at his apartments in the Grand
Pump Hotel. The missive ran:--
"My dear Dr. Frampton,--As a friend rather than a patient, I beg
you to come to me without delay! Pray ask no questions of
Gumbo, who knows nothing. You will need no spurring when I
tell you that though in no worse than my usual health, a few
hours may see me in eternity.
Confidently yours,
Orlando Dignum (Major)."
I folded the letter, and nodded to Gumbo. "Tell your master that I
will delay only to shave and dress before calling on him."
The faithful fellow had been watching me anxiously. "In the name of
goodness, doctor, ain't you going to tell me what's wrong?"
"I know as little as you," said I. "But, whatever it is, the Major
thinks it serious; so run, my man, and say that I am following."
With something like a groan, Gumbo started off, and I turned to Mr.
MacRea. "You will find a cup of coffee in your room," I said.
"I must attend to this sudden call; but possibly by the time you have
washed and changed, I may be free to rejoin you at breakfast, when we
can talk at leisure."
The young man had caught up his valise, but set it down again and
laid three fingers on my sleeve. "You speak of a change of clothes,
sir. I will be frank with you--these breeches in which you behold me
are my only ones. They were a present from my mother's sister,
resident in Paisley, and I misdoubt there will have been something
amiss in her instructions to the tailor, for they gall me woundily--
though in justice to her and the honest tradesman I should add that
my legs, maybe, are out of practice since leaving Glasgow. At Largs,
sir, I have been reverting to the ancestral garb."
"You'll wear no such thing about the Hotwells," I interposed.
"Indeed, I was not thinking it likely. My purpose was to procure
another pair on my arrival--aye, and I would do so before breaking
fast, had not circumstances which I will not detain you by relating
put this for the moment out of the question. Do not mistake me, Dr.
Frampton. In public I will thole these dreadful articles, though it
cost me my skin; but in private, sir, if as a favour you will allow
me--if, as a bachelor yourself, you will take it _sans gene_.
And, by-the-by, I trust you will not scruple to point out any small
defects in my French accent, which has been acquired entirely from
books."
He had, in fact, pronounced it "jeen," but I put this by.
"Quite impossible, Mr. MacRea! I have to think of the servants."
"Eh? You have servants!"
"Four or five," said I.
His eyes seemed ready to start out of his head. "I had opined by the
way you opened the door with your own hand--" He broke off, and
exclaimed: "Four or five servants! It will be a grand practice of
yours! Well, go your ways, Dr. Frampton--I must e'en study to live
up to you."
Having piloted my eccentric upstairs and left him to his toilet,
I lost no time in dressing and presenting myself at the Grand Pump
Hotel, where I found my West Indian friend in a truly deplorable
state of agitation. His face, ordinarily rubicund, bore traces of a
sleepless night; indeed, it was plain that he had not changed his
clothes since leaving the Assembly Rooms, where he invariably spent
his evenings at a game of _faro_ for modest stakes. He grasped my
hand, springing up to do so from a writing-table whereon lay several
sheets of foolscap paper.
"Ah! my dear friend, you are late!" was his greeting.
"I thought I had been moderately expeditious," said I.
"Yes, yes--perhaps so." He consulted his watch. "But with an affair
of this sort hanging over one, the minutes drag. And yet, Heaven
knows, mine may be few enough."
"Pardon me," I said, "but to what sort of affair are you alluding?"
"An affair of honour," he answered tragically.
"Eh?" I said. "A duel! You have engaged yourself to fight a duel?"
He nodded. "Then I will have nothing to do with it," I announced
with decision.
"Aye," said he with marked irony, "it is at such a pinch that one
discovers his true friends! But fortunately I had no sooner
dispatched Gumbo in search of you than I foresaw some chance of this
pusillanimity of which you give me proof."
"Pusillanimity?" I interjected. "It is nothing of the kind. But you
seem to forget my position here as honorary physician to the
Hotwells."
"We'll call it lukewarmness, then," he went on in yet more biting
tones. "At the risk of seeming intrusive, I at once knocked up two
Irish gentlemen on the landing above who had been audibly making a
night of it while I sat here endeavouring to compose my thoughts to
the calmness proper for framing a testamentary disposition.
Although perfect strangers to me, they cheerfully granted what you
have denied me; consented with alacrity--nay, with enthusiasm--to act
as my seconds in this affair; and started to carry my cartel--which,
having gone to bed in their boots, they were able to do with the
smallest possible delay."
"You have not yet told me the nature of the quarrel," I suggested.
His face at once resumed its wonted colour--nay, took on an extra
tinge inclining to purple. "And I don't intend to!" he snapped.
"Then you no longer need my services?"
"Fortunately no, since you make such a pother of granting them.
Stay--you might witness my will here, to which I am about to affix my
signature."
"With pleasure," said I. "But who is to be the other witness?
The law requires two, you know."
"Confound it--so it does! I had forgotten. We might ring up the
Boots, eh?"
"Better avoid dragging the servants of the hotel into this business,
especially if you would keep your intention secret. How about
Gumbo?"
"He's black, to begin with, and moreover he benefits under the
document to the extent of a small legacy."
"That rules him out, at any rate. Ha!" I exclaimed, glancing out of
window, "the very man!"
"Who?"
"An excellent fellow at this moment crossing the gardens towards the
Mall--he is early this morning; a discreet, solid citizen, and able
to keep his counsel as well as any man in the Hotwells; our leading
jeweller, Mr. Jenkinson."