among the people but was violently opposed by the regular corps of
physicians and surgeons. Mr. Fessenden, as might be expected, was a
believer in the efficacy of the tractors, and, at the request of
Perkins, consented to make them the subject of a poem in Hudibrastic
verse, the satire of which was to be levelled against their opponents.
"Terrible Tractoration" was the result. It professes to be a poetical
petition from Dr. Christopher Caustic, a medical gentleman who has been
ruined by the success of the metallic tractors, and who applies to the
Royal College of Physicians for relief and redress. The wits of the
poor doctor have been somewhat shattered by his misfortunes; and, with
crazy ingenuity, he contrives to heap ridicule on his medical brethren,
under pretence of railing against Perkinism. The poem is in four
cantos, the first of which is the best, and the most characteristic of
the author. It is occupied with Dr. Caustic's description of his
mechanical and scientific contrivances, embracing all sorts of possible
and impossible projects; every one of which, however, has a ridiculous
plausibility. The inexhaustible variety in which they flow forth proves
the author's invention unrivalled in its way. It shows what had been
the nature of Mr. Fessenden's mental toil during his residence in
London, continually brooding over the miracles of mechanism and science,
his enthusiasm for which had cost him so dear. Long afterwards,
speaking of the first conception of this poem, the author told me that
he had shaped it out during a solitary day's ramble in the outskirts of
London; and the character of Dr. Caustic so strongly impressed itself on
his mind, that, as be walked homeward through the crowded streets, he
burst into frequent fits of laughter.

The truth is, that, in the sketch of this wild projector, Mr. Fessenden
had caricatured some of his own features; and, when he laughed so
heartily, it was at the perception of the resemblance.