whether they had ever been there), and then retailed it into several
cantons to certain dealers, who carried over colonies, but were all
shipwrecked in the voyage; upon which Lord Peter sold the said
continent to other customers again and again, and again and again,
with the same success.

The second project I shall mention was his sovereign remedy for the
worms, especially those in the spleen. The patient was to eat
nothing after supper for three nights; as soon as he went to bed, he
was carefully to lie on one side, and when he grew weary, to turn
upon the other. He must also duly confine his two eyes to the same
object, and by no means break wind at both ends together without
manifest occasion. These prescriptions diligently observed, the
worms would void insensibly by perspiration ascending through the
brain.

A third invention was the erecting of a whispering-office for the
public good and ease of all such as are hypochondriacal or troubled
with the cholic, as likewise of all eavesdroppers, physicians,
midwives, small politicians, friends fallen out, repeating poets,
lovers happy or in despair, bawds, privy-counsellors, pages,
parasites and buffoons, in short, of all such as are in danger of
bursting with too much wind. An ass's head was placed so
conveniently, that the party affected might easily with his mouth
accost either of the animal's ears, which he was to apply close for
a certain space, and by a fugitive faculty peculiar to the ears of
that animal, receive immediate benefit, either by eructation, or
expiration, or evomition.

Another very beneficial project of Lord Peter's was an office of