Some of the old English doctors were gay fellows amongst the ladies,
according to the best authorities. Nevertheless, few men have arrived at
eminence in the medical profession who were known to be afflicted with an
overplus of romantic or sentimental qualities in their composition.
It may be interesting, particularly to ladies, to know that the majority
of those physicians who have arrived at the dignity of knighthood owe
their elevation rather to the smiles of love than the rewards of
professional efforts. "Considering the opportunities that medical men have
for pressing a suit in love, and the many temptations to gentle emotion
that they experience in the aspect of female suffering, and the confiding
gratitude of their fair patients, it is to be wondered at that only one
medical duke is to be found in the annals of the peerage." But the
physician usually has quite sufficient self-control and honor about him,
not only to keep his own tender sensibilities in subjection, but often to
check those of his grateful and emotional female patient.
Thackeray has said that "girls of rank make love in the nursery, and
practise the arts of coquetry upon the page boy who brings up the coals
and kindlings."
In this connection Mr. Jeaffreson, whose narratives have the virtue of
being true as well as interesting, says, "I could point to a fair matron
who now enjoys rank and wealth among the highest, who not only aimed
tender glances, and sighed amorously upon a young, waxen-faced, blue-eyed
apothecary, but even went so far as to write him a letter proposing an
elopement, and other merry arrangements, in which a 'carriage and four,'
to speed them over the country, bore a conspicuous part."
The "silly maiden" had, like Dinah, a "fortune in silver and gold," of
about two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and her tall, blue-eyed
Adonis, to whom she made this _almost_ resistless proposal, was twice her
age. But he was a gentleman of honor, and, being in the confidence of the
family, he generously, without divulging the mad proposition of the fair
young lady, induced the father to take her to the continent, for a
twelvemonth's change of air and scenery.
"What a cold-blooded wretch!" will some fair reader exclaim.
"What a fool he was, to be sure!" says the bachelor fortune-seeker.
Well, she didn't die for her first unrequited love, but married a "very
great man," and became the mother of several children. And this is the way
the fair heroine of this little story avenged herself upon this "Joseph
amongst doctors."
Very recently she manifested her good will to the man who had offered her
what is generally regarded as the greatest insult a woman can experience,
by procuring a commission in the army for his eldest son.
It is interesting to note the various qualities which have attracted the
attention, or love, of different sons of Æsculapius to female beauties.
Sometimes it has been her hair, the "pride of a woman," that was the point
of attraction, as it was with Dr. Mead, "whose highest delight was to comb
the luxuriant tresses of the lady on whom he lavished his affections;" or
the "eyes of heavenly blue," like the lady love's of Dr. Elliot, senior;
or the tiny footprint in the sand, like that which first attracted Dr.
Robert Ames to the woman of his choice. What the point of attraction was
in the man is not easily ascertained.
A gay and dangerous beau among the "high ladies" was Dr. Hugh Smithson,
the father of James Smithson (his illegitimate son), the founder of the
"Smithsonian Institution" at Washington. Sir Hugh's forte lay in his
remarkably handsome person, said to be only second to Sir Astley Cooper in
beauty of form and features. However, he had the address which secured to
him one of the handsomest and proudest heiresses of England, and this is
how he accomplished it.
He was but the grandson of a Yorkshire baronet, "with no prospects," and
was apprenticed to an apothecary, and for a long time paid court to mortar
and pestle at Hutton Garden. The story runs, that the handsome doctor had
been mittened by a "belle of private rank and modest wealth," and that
the only child and heiress of Seymour, Duke of Somerset, and an
acquaintance of Sir Hugh's, heard of his rejection, when she publicly
observed that "the beauty who had disdained such a man was guilty of a
folly that no other woman in England would have been."
Sir Hugh would have been unwise not to have taken this broad hint, and he
did what none of the heiress's suitors, even of high rank, had yet aspired
to,--proposed, and was accepted. Sixteen years later he was created Duke
of Northumberland, and could well afford to laugh in his sleeve at the
proposition that "his coronet should be surrounded with _senna_ leaves,
instead of strawberry," since he had reached a rank that no other M. D.
had previously done, and possessed the "_loveliest woman in England_," and
a great fortune, to boot.
Lord Glenbervie, who from the druggist's counter reached the peerage, was
taunted by Sheridan with his plebeian origin, from which a patrician wife
had redeemed him, in the following amusing verse:--
"Glenbervie, Glenbervie!
What's good for the scurvy?
But why is the doctor forgot?
In his arms he should quarter
A pestle and mortar,
For his crest an immense gallipot."
Sir John Elliot was another handsome doctor of that period, who,
notwithstanding his being disliked by King George, could, with small
effort and large impudence, "capture the hearts of half the prettiest
women amongst the king's subjects, and then shrug his shoulders with
chagrin at his success." "One lady, the daughter of a nobleman, ignorant
that he was otherwise occupied, made him an offer, and on learning, to her
surprise and mortification, that he was already married, vowed she would
not rest till she had assassinated his wife."
Dr. Arbuthnot, whose courtly address, sparkling wit, ready flow of
language, innate cordiality, and polished manners made him a great
favorite about London, was one of the finest looking gentlemen of his
time. The doctor was contemporary with Dean Swift, with whom he used to
enjoy flirtations with the queen's maids of honor about St. James.
"Arm in arm with the dean, he used to peer about St. James, jesting,
laughing, causing matronly dowagers to smile at 'that dear Mr. Dean,' and
young girls, out for their first season at court, green and
unsophisticated, to blush with annoyance at his coarse, shameless
badinage,--bowing to this great man, from whom he hoped for countenance;
staring insolently at that one, from whom he expected nothing; quoting
Martial to the prelate, who could not understand Latin; whispering French
to a youthful diplomatist, who knew no tongue but English; and continually
angling for the bishopric, which he never got."
From flattering court beauties, Arbuthnot became flatterer to the gouty,
hypochondriacal old queen. But wine and women made sad havoc with poor
Arbuthnot, who died in very straitened circumstances.
Dr. Mead, before mentioned, was twice married. He was fifty-one years old
when married the second time, to a baronet's daughter. Fortunate beyond
fortunate men, he had the great _mis_-fortune of outliving his usefulness.
His sight failed, and his powers underwent that gradual decay which is the
saddest of all possible conclusions to a vigorous and dignified existence.
Even his valets domineered over him. Long before this his second
childhood, he excited the ridicule of the town by his vanity and absurd
pretensions as a "lady-killer."
"The extravagances of his amorous senility were not only whispered about,
but some contemptible fellow seized upon the unpleasant rumors, and
published them in a scandalous novelette, wherein the doctor was
represented as a 'Cornuter of seventy-five,' when, to please the damsel
who 'warmed his aged heart,'--she was a blacksmith's daughter,--the
doctor, long past threescore and ten, went to Paris, and learned to
dance."
[Illustration: AN AGED PUPIL.]
Dr. Richard Mead died aged eighty-one. The sale of his library, pictures,
and statues brought the heirs eighty thousand dollars. His other effects
amounted to one hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars.
Another Dr. Mead, uncle to the above, lived to the age of one hundred and
forty-nine years. Both of these physicians were remarkable for their
kindness and liberality. The latter left five pounds a year to the poor,
to continue forever.