thanked Heaven for it, and put it to a good use (at least he intended it
so) by concocting drugs; which perhaps did a little towards peopling the
graveyard, into which his windows looked; but that was neither his purpose
nor his fault. None of the sleepers, at all events, interrupted their
slumbers to upbraid him. He had done according to his own artless
conscience and the recipes of licensed physicians, and he looked no
further, but pounded, triturated, infused, made electuaries, boluses,
juleps, or whatever he termed his productions, with skill and diligence,
thanking Heaven that he was spared to do so, when his contemporaries
generally were getting incapable of similar efforts. It struck him with
some surprise, but much gratitude to Providence, that his sight seemed to
be growing rather better than worse. He certainly could read the crabbed
handwriting and hieroglyphics of the physicians with more readiness than
he could a year earlier. But he had been originally near-sighted, with
large, projecting eyes; and near-sighted eyes always seem to get a new
lease of light as the years go on. One thing was perceptible about the
Doctor's eyes, not only to himself in the glass, but to everybody else;
namely, that they had an unaccustomed gleaming brightness in them; not so
very bright either, but yet so much so, that little Pansie noticed it, and
sometimes, in her playful, roguish way, climbed up into his lap, and put
both her small palms over them; telling Grandpapa that he had stolen
somebody else's eyes, and given away his own, and that she liked his old
ones better. The poor old Doctor did his best to smile through his eyes,
and so to reconcile Pansie to their brightness: but still she continually
made the same silly remonstrance, so that he was fain to put on a pair of
green spectacles when he was going to play with Pansie, or took her on his
knee. Nay, if he looked at her, as had always been his custom, after she
was asleep, in order to see that all was well with her, the little child
would put up her hands, as if he held a light that was flashing on her
eyeballs; and unless he turned away his gaze quickly, she would wake up in