"His lordship for his doctor sent,
My treatment to begin;
I wish that he had called him out
Before he called him in!
For though to physic he was bred,
And passed at Surgeons' Hall,
To make his post a sinecure,
He never cured at all!

"The Doctor looked about my breast
And then about my back,
And then he shook his head and said,
'Your case looks very black.'
At first he sent me hot cayenne,
And then gamboge to swallow.
But still my fever would not turn
To scarlet or to yellow!

"With madder and with turmeric,
He made his next attack;
But neither he nor all his drugs
Could stop my dying black.
At last I got so sick of life,
And sick of being dosed,
One Monday morning I gave up
My physic and the ghost!

"Oh, Phoebe dear, what pain it was
To sever every tie!