The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle by Tobias George Smollett
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page 32 of 1065 (03%)
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exert her uttermost in nursing, tending, and cherishing her during
the term of her important charge. With this view she purchased Culpepper's Midwifery, which with that sagacious performance dignified with Aristotle's name, she studied with indefatigable care; and diligently perused the Complete Housewife, together with Quincy's Dispensatory, culling every jelly, marmalade, and conserve which these authors recommend as either salutary or toothsome, for the benefit and comfort of her sister-in-law, during her gestation. She restricted her from eating roots, pot-herbs, fruit, and all sorts of vegetables; and one day, when Mrs. Pickle had plucked a peach with her own hand, and was in the very act of putting it between her teeth, Mrs. Grizzle perceived the rash attempt, and running up to her, fell on her knees in the garden, entreating her, with tears in her eyes, to desist such a pernicious appetite. Her request was no sooner complied with, than recollecting, that if her sister's longing was balked, the child might be affected with some disagreeable mark or deplorable disease, she begged as earnestly that she would swallow the fruit, and in the mean time ran for some cordial water of her own composing, which she forced on her sister, as an antidote to the poison she had received. This excessive zeal and tenderness did not fail to be very troublesome to Mrs. Pickle, who, having resolved divers plans for the recovery of her own ease, at length determined to engage Mrs. Grizzle in such employment as would interrupt that close attendance, which she found so teasing and disagreeable. Neither did she wait long for an opportunity of putting her resolution in practice. The very next day a gentleman happening to dine with Mr. Pickle, unfortunately mentioned a pine-apple, part of which he had eaten a week before at the house of a nobleman, who lived in another part of the country, |
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