Passing by York Place, where bustling menials and crowding courtiers announced the ostentatious power of the proud prelate who there reigned, they left the royal mansions also behind them, and entering into some of the narrower and more intricate streets in Westminster, soon reached a house with a small court before it, which, as the boy informed Sir Osborne, was the dwelling of the physician.
Seeing a door open opposite, the knight entered and found himself in a sort of scullery, where a stout servant-girl was busily engaged in scrubbing some pots and crucibles with such assiduity, that she could scarcely leave off even to answer his inquiry of whether her master was at home.
"Yes, sir; yes, he is at home," replied she at length; "but he cannot be spoken with, unless you are very bad, for he is busy in the laboratory."
The knight signified that he had a great desire to speak with him; and the girl, looking at him somewhat more attentively, said that, "if he were from abroad, the doctor would see him she was sure, for he had a great many foreign folks with him always."
The knight replied that, though he was not a foreigner, he certainly had come from abroad very lately; upon which assurance the damsel relinquished her crucible-scrubbing, and went to announce his presence. Returning in a few minutes, she ushered him through a long dark passage into a large low-roofed room, at the farther end of which appeared a furnace, with the chimney carried through the ceiling, and near it various tables covered with all sorts of strange vessels and utensils. Round about, still nearer the door, were strewed old mouldering books and manuscripts, huge masses of several kinds of ore, heaps of coal and charcoal, and piles of many other matters, the nature of which Sir Osborne could not discover by the scanty light that found its way through two small lattice windows near the roof.
The principal curiosity in the room yet remained. Standing before the furnace, holding in one hand a candle sweltering in the heat of the fire, and in the other a pair of chemical tongs embracing a crucible, was seen a stout portly man, of a rosy complexion, with a fur cap on his head, and his body invested in a long coarse black gown, the sleeves of which, tucked up above his elbows, exhibited a full puffed shirt of very fine linen, much too white and clean for the occupation in which he was busied.
"Sir, my wench tells me you are from abroad," said he, advancing a little, and speaking quick. "From Flanders, I see, by your dress. Pray, sir, do you come from the learned Erasmus, or from Meyerden? However, I am glad to see you. You are an adept, I am sure; I see it in your countenance. Behold this crucible," and he poked it so near Sir Osborne's nose as to make him start back and sneeze violently with the fumes. "Sir, that is a new effect," continued the doctor: "I am sure that I have found it. It makes people sneeze. That is the hundred and thirteenth effect I have discovered in it. Every hour, every moment, as it concentrates, I discover new effects; so that doubtless by the time it is perfectly concreted, it will have all powers, even to the great effect, and change all things into gold. But let us put that down;" and taking a paper he wrote, "One hundred and thirteenth effect, makes people sneeze; violently, I think you said? Violently. And now, my dear sir, what news from the great Erasmus?"
"None that I know, my good sir," answered Sir Osborne, "as I never had the advantage of his acquaintance."
An explanation now ensued, which at last enlightened the ideas of the worthy physician, although he had so fully possessed himself with the fancy that the knight was an adept from Flanders, a country at that time famous for alchymical researches, that it was some time before he could entirely disembarrass his brain from the notion.
"Bless my soul!" cried he; "so you are the young gentleman that my excellent good uncle Wilbraham was concerned about; and well he might be, truly, seeing what a lover you are of the profound and noble science. He came here yesterday to inquire for you, and finding that I had heard nothing of you, I thought he would have gone distracted. But tell me, fair sir, have you met with any of the famous green water of Palliardo? Ha! I see you were not to be deceived. I procured some, and truly, on dipping the blade of a knife therein, it appeared gilt. But what was it? A mere solution of copper."