A PRINTER in the office crawled under the bed of the machine to replace
something--a nut that had dropped; it was not known that he was there;
the crank came round and crushed him against the brickwork. The embrace
of iron is death.
Alere fed his helpless children, and apprenticed them when they were old
enough.
Ten pounds was enough for him--without ambition, and without
business-avarice; ten pounds was enough for his Fleet Street life.
It was not only the actual money he gave away, but the kindness of the
man. Have you ever noticed the boys who work in printing-offices?--their
elbows seem so sharp and pointed, bony, and without flesh. Instead of
the shirt-sleeve being turned up, it looks as if the pointed elbow had
thrust its way through.
He always had something for them;--a plate of beef, soup, beer to be
shared, apples, baked potatoes, now and then half-a-dozen mild cigars.
Awful this, was it not? Printers' boys _will_ smoke; they had better
have Flamma's fine tobacco than the vile imitation they buy.
They always had a tale for him; either their mothers, or sisters, or
some one was in trouble; Flamma was certain to do something, however
little might be within his power. At least he went to see.
Had a man an income of a million he could not relieve the want of
London; the wretch relieved to-day needs again to-morrow. But Alere went
to see.
Ten pounds did much in the shaky hands of a man without ambition, and
without business-avarice, who went to see the unfortunate.
His own palsied mother, at the verge of life, looked to Alere for all
that the son can do for the parent. Other sons seemed more capable of
such duty; yet it invariably fell upon Alere. He was the Man. And for
those little luxuries and comforts that soothe the dull hours of
trembling age she depended entirely upon him.
So you see the ten-pound notes that satisfied him were not all spent in
drink.
But alas! once now and then the rats began to run up the wall in broad
daylight, and foolish Alere, wise in this one thing, immediately began
to pack his carpet-bag. He put in his collars, his slippers, his
sketch-books and pencils, some of his engraving tools, and a few blocks
of boxwood, his silver-mounted flute, and a book for Amaryllis. He
packed his carpet-bag and hastened away to his Baden-Baden, to Coombe
Oaks, his spa among the apple-bloom, the song of finches, and rustle of
leaves.
They sat and talked in the round summer-house in Iden's garden, with the
summer unfolding at their knees; Amaryllis, Amadis, Iden, and Flamma.
By Flamma's side there stood a great mug of the Goliath ale, and between
his lips there was a long churchwarden pipe.
The Goliath ale was his mineral water; his gaseous, alkaline, chalybeate
liquor; better by far than Kissingen, Homburg, Vichy; better by far than
mud baths and hot springs. There is no medicine in nature, or made by
man, like good ale. He who drinks ale is strong.
The bitter principle of the aromatic hops went to his nervous system, to
the much-suffering liver, to the clogged and weary organs, bracing and
stimulating, urging on, vitalizing anew.
The spirit drawn from the joyous barley warmed his heart; a cordial
grown on the sunny hill-side, watered with dew and sweet rain, coloured
by the light, a liquor of sunshine, potable sunbeam.
Age mingling hops and barley in that just and equitable proportion, no
cunning of hand, no science can achieve, gave to it the vigour of years,
the full manhood of strength.
There was in it an alchemic power analysis cannot define. The chemist
analyzes, and he finds of ten parts, there are this and there are that,
and the residue is "volatile principle," for which all the dictionaries
of science have no explanation.
"Volatile principle"--there it is, that is the secret. That is the life
of the thing; by no possible means can you obtain that volatile
principle--that alchemic force--except contained in genuine old ale.
Only it must be genuine, and it must be old; such as Iden brewed.
The Idens had been famous for ale for generations.
By degrees Alere's hand grew less shaky; the glass ceased to chink
against his teeth; the strong, good ale was setting his Fleet Street
liver in order.
You have "liver," you have "dyspepsia," you have "kidneys," you have
"abdominal glands," and the doctor tells you you must take bitters,
_i.e._, quassia, buchu, gentian, cascarilla, calumba; aperients and
diluents, podophyllin, taraxacum, salts; physic for the nerves and
blood, quinine, iron, phosphorus; this is but the briefest outline of
your draughts and preparations; add to it for various purposes, liquor
arsenicalis, bromide of potassium, strychnia, belladonna.
Weary and disappointed, you turn to patent medicines--American and
French patent physic is very popular now--and find the same things
precisely under taking titles, enormously advertised.
It is a fact that nine out of ten of the medicines compounded are
intended to produce exactly the same effects as are caused by a few
glasses of good old ale. The objects are to set the great glands in
motion, to regulate the stomach, brace the nerves, and act as a tonic
and cordial; a little ether put in to aid the digestion of the
compound. This is precisely what good old ale does, and digests itself
very comfortably. Above all things, it contains the volatile principle,
which the prescriptions have not got.
Many of the compounds actually are beer, bittered with quassia instead
of hops; made nauseous in order that you may have faith in them.
"Throw physic to the dogs," get a cask of the true Goliath, and "_drenk
un down to the therd hoop_."
Long before Alere had got to the first hoop the rats ceased to run up
the wall, his hand became less shaky, he began to play a very good knife
and fork at the bacon and Iden's splendid potatoes; by-and-by he began
to hum old German songs.
But you may ask, how do _you_ know, you're not a doctor, you're a mere
story-spinner, you're no authority? I reply that I am in a position to
know much more than a doctor.
How can that be?
Because I have been a Patient. It is so much easier to be a doctor than
a patient. The doctor imagines what his prescriptions are like and what
they will do; he imagines, but the Patient _knows_.
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