right, whatever that conviction may cost us. Abbey Hill had been in the
habit of appointing, amongst other objects of patronage, its own
physician. But that habit had fallen into disuse during the latter years
of my predecessor's practice. His superiority over all other medical men
in the town had become so incontestable, that, though he was emphatically
the doctor of Low Town, the head of its hospitals and infirmaries, and by
birth related to its principal traders, still as Abbey Hill was
occasionally subject to the physical infirmities of meaner mortals, so on
those occasions it deemed it best not to push the point of honour to the
wanton sacrifice of life. Since Low Town possessed one of the most
famous physicians in England, Abbey Hill magnanimously resolved not to
crush him by a rival. Abbey Hill let him feel its pulse.

When my predecessor retired, I had presumptuously expected that the
Hill would have continued to suspend its normal right to a special
physician, and shown to me the same generous favour it had shown to him,
who had declared me worthy to succeed to his honours. I had the more
excuse for this presumption because the Hill had already allowed me to
visit a fair proportion of its invalids, had said some very gracious
things to me about the great respectability of the Fenwick family, and
sent me some invitations to dinner, and a great many invitations to tea.

But my self-conceit received a notable check. Abbey Hill declared
that the time had come to reassert its dormant privilege; it must have a
doctor of its own choosing,--a doctor who might, indeed, be permitted to
visit Low Town from motives of humanity or gain, but who must
emphatically assert his special allegiance to Abbey Hill by fixing his
home on that venerable promontory. Miss Brabazon, a spinster of
uncertain age but undoubted pedigree, with small fortune but high nose,
which she would pleasantly observe was a proof of her descent from