"The only thing for you," said Fitzgerald, taking a long pinch of snuff; "and I grieve to say you have a most villainous look of good health about you."
"I must acknowledge I have seldom felt better."
"So much the worse—so much the worse," said Fitzgerald despondingly. "Is there no family complaint; no respectable heir-loom of infirmity, you can lay claim to from your kindred?"
"None, that I know of, unless a very active performance on the several occasions of breakfast, dinner, and supper, with a tendency towards port, and an inclination to sleep ten in every twenty-four hours, be a sign of sickness; these symptoms I have known many of the family suffer for years, without the slightest alleviation, though, strange as it may appear, they occasionally had medical advice."
Fitz. took no notice of my sneer at the faculty, but proceeded to strike my chest several times, with his finger tips. "Try a short cough now," said he. "Ah, that will never do!"
"Do you ever flush. Before dinner I mean?"
"Occasionally, when I meet with a luncheon."
"I'm fairly puzzled," said poor Fitz. throwing himself into a chair; "gout is a very good thing; but, then, you see you are only a sub., and it is clearly against the articles of war, to have it before being a field officer at least. Apoplexy is the best I can do for you; and, to say the truth, any one who witnesses your performance at mess, may put faith in the likelihood of it.
"Do you think you could get up a fit for the medical board," said Fitz., gravely.
"Why, if absolutely indispensable," said I, "and with good instruction—something this way. Eh, is it not?"