"Hist!--don't talk of her. All mercenary; every bit of her fawning!
Would you believe it? I give her ten shillings a week, besides all that
goes down of my pats of butter and rolls, and I overheard the jade saying
to the laundress that 'I could not last long; and she 'd--EXPECTATIONS!'
Ah, Mr. Dale, when one thinks of the sinfulness there is in this life!
But I'll not think of it. No, I'll not. Let us change the subject. You
were asking my doctor's name. It is--"

Here the woman with "expectations" threw open the door, and suddenly
announced "DR. MORGAN."




CHAPTER IV.

The parson started, and so did Leonard.

The homoeopathist did not at first notice either. With an unobservant
bow to the visitors, he went straight to the patient, and asked, "How go
the symptoms?"

Therewith the captain commenced, in a tone of voice like a schoolboy
reciting the catalogue of the ships in Homer. He had been evidently
conning the symptoms, and learning them by heart. Nor was there a single
nook or corner in his anatomical organization, so far as the captain was
acquainted with that structure, but what some symptom or other was
dragged therefrom, and exposed to day. The squire listened with horror
to the morbific inventory, muttering at each dread interval, "Bless me!