HORA ODONTALGICA.
“Again the play of pain
Shoots o’er his features, as the sudden gust
Crisps the reluctant lake.”
Byron.
(Throb—throb—throb—) Oh this marrow-piercing, jaw-torturing, peace-destroying pain!—(throb—throb—throb—) Sure the rack were a plaything, lunar-caustic a balsam, aqua-fortis the very essence of pleasure, compared with this soul-and-body-distracting torment—this anguish double-refined, this agony of agonies. “A little patience, my dear sir,” interrupted a soothing voice. ‘Patience!’ exclaimed I, ‘talk of patience to a cubless bear, a dinnerless wolf, an officeless demagogue—but not to me. Would you look for moderation in a maniac? wisdom in an idiot? gentility in a clown? Who expects patience of a man driven to distraction by the tooth-ache?—(Throb—throb—throb—) Oh! that arrow-like pang——the most excruciating of all!—And I clapped my hands to my jaws, and springing from my chair, shrieked in agony. “Let’s see your tooth,” grumbled a rough unfeeling voice—and before me stood a veteran Esculapian, with his lancet and forceps fearfully conspicuous. ‘On with your instrument, Doctor,’ exclaimed I, ‘and out with it, though I die under the operation.’ My head was soon made stationary between two brawny hands, and my jaws extended to their widest angle; the knife had unbared the offending dental, and the dreaded instrument was ready for its work—but suddenly the pain subsided—my feelings changed—I looked on the ‘cold iron’ with horror—‘No! I’ll not have it out now;’—and the man of forceps left me.
Again felt I the pangs of a ‘jumping’ tooth-ache. Powders—drops—essential oils—remedies of every genus and species were tried in vain. Even red-hot iron was of no avail—the nerve was fire-proof. Throwing myself into a rocking chair, with elbows on my knees and hands on my jaws, I leaned over the fire in moody anguish. “The mind,” say physicians, “exerts a sympathetic influence upon the body.” ‘Perhaps then,’ thought I, ‘the disease may not be wholly physical, after all;’—and I began to reflect that suffering often apparently finds relief in association and sympathy. The hard-featured mariner takes delight in tales of naval misery; the veteran warrior, in descriptions of battles; the love-lorn maiden, in ‘doleful tales of love and woe;’ the disappointed suitor in dark maledictions and long-drawn vituperations, against all that bear the name of woman.
With this in mind, I glanced at my book-case for some treatise adapted to my own circumstances. Nothing presented itself more to the point than the ‘Works of Robert Burns.’ His ‘Address to the Tooth-ache’ was soon before me. I read it from beginning to end with profound attention. The difficult Scotticisms were explained in the glossary. I sought the meaning of every word—I entered fully into the spirit of the piece. How beautiful!
“My curse upon thy venom’d stang,
That shoots my tortur’d gums alang;
An’ thro’ my lugs gies monie a twang,
Wi’ gnawing vengeance;
Tearing my nerves wi’ bitter pang,
Like racking engines!
When fevers burn, or ague freezes,
Rheumatics gnaw, or colic squeezes,
Our neighbor’s sympathy may ease us,
Wi’ pitying moan;
But thee—thou hell o’ a’ diseases,
Ay mocks our groan!
Adown my beard the slavers trickle!
I throw the wee stools o’er the meikle,
As round the fire the giglets keckle
To see me loup;
While raving mad I wish a heckle
Were in their doup.
O’ a’ the num’rous human dools,
Ill har’sts, daft bargains, cutty-stools,
Or worthy friends rack’d i’ the mools,
Sad sight to see!
The tricks o’ knaves, or fash o’ fools,
Thou bear’st the gree.
Where’er that place be priests ca’ hell,
Whence a’ the tunes o’ mis’ry yell,
And ranked plagues their numbers tell,
In dreadfu’ raw,
Thou, Tooth-ache, surely bear’st the bell
Amang them a’!
O thou grim mischief-making chiel,
That gars the notes of discord squeel,
Till daft mankind aft dance a reel
In gore a shoe-thick;
Gie a’ the faes o’ Scotland’s weel
A towmond’s Tooth-ache!”
Never before had it appeared in half so favorable a light. Never before was I so thoroughly convinced that to appreciate the beauties of an author, we must enter into his feelings—possess his spirit. This I could now do perfectly. And those brief stanzas—where was there ever such genuine poetry as in them? Byron, in comparison, was fustian; Milton bombast; Shakspeare a mere poetaster, and Homer a sleepy-head—‘quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus.’
The effect was astonishing. Ere I had finished the fifth reading, my sufferings were so much alleviated, that I could even recognize my own countenance in a mirror—though still somewhat distorted. After the tenth reading, however, the kindly influence ceased. In vain did I persevere; the fifteenth perusal was accomplished; but all to no purpose. The twang—twang—twang—and the gnawing, wrenching, screwing sensation still continued. Again I leaned over the fire in silent despair. I revolved in my mind the poem I had just read—the sentiment—the meter—the rhyme. A thought struck me. This eternal snap, snap, snap, said I to myself, is meter; this perpetual recurrence of similar pains is rhyme; these momentary cessations of agony are intervals of stanzas. Surely the tooth-ache, thought I, is a poetical subject. Coleridge lay open on my table. My eye rested on a scrap of rhythmical Latin.
“Dormi, Jesu! Mater ridet,
Quae tam dulcem somnum videt,
Dormi Jesu! blandule!
Si non dormis, Mater plorat,
Inter fila cantans orat
Blande, veni, somnule.”
The hint was sufficient. Ainsworth and the glossary soon enabled me to metamorphose Burns’s Scotch into Monkish Latin. If the meter appear sometimes lame, or the syntax barbarous, the blame be on the torturing pulsations that guided the movement—on the disorganizing twinges that convulsed my whole mental fabric.