CHAPTER V.

"_Volpone_. A little in a mist, but not dejected;
Never--but still myself."
BEN JONSON: _Volpone_.

"_Peregrine_. Am I enough disguised?
_Mer_. Ay. I warrant you.
_Per_. Save you, fair lady."--Ibid.

It is an ill wind that blows nobody good. The ill wind that had blown
gout to Lord Lilburne had blown Lord Lilburne away from the injury he had
meditated against what he called "the object of his attachment." How
completely and entirely, indeed, the state of Lord Lilburne's feelings
depended on the state of his health, may be seen in the answer he gave to
his valet, when, the morning after the first attack of the gout, that
worthy person, by way of cheering his master, proposed to ascertain
something as to the movements of one with whom Lord Lilburne professed to
be so violently in love,--"Confound you, Dykeman!" exclaimed the
invalid,--"why do you trouble me about women when I'm in this condition?
I don't care if they were all at the bottom of the sea! Reach me the
colchicum! I must keep my mind calm."

Whenever tolerably well, Lord Lilburne was careless of his health; the
moment he was ill, Lord Lilburne paid himself the greatest possible
attention. Though a man of firm nerves, in youth of remarkable daring,
and still, though no longer rash, of sufficient personal courage, he was
by no means fond of the thought of death--that is, of his _own_ death.
Not that he was tormented by any religious apprehensions of the Dread