Amy had a hysterical fit, or was afflicted with sore eyes, I forget which; but I know that she was very bad and vented her rage in all the refined expressions usual on these most celebrated occasions. It will scarcely be expected that I should feel much commiseration for her. When I state these facts it must be understood that Amy said so; but then, will methodistical Luttrell add, with his eyes turned up towards the sky, or the ceiling, as the chance may be—if all the lies that have been uttered since the flood were put into a scale with Amy's, they would weigh as a hair in the balance; so that, perhaps, the less I say on this matter the better.
At last, when a whole month had elapsed beyond the period Amy had named for the expected event, Argyle could keep on the mask no longer; and, having asked her one evening how she felt, and received for answer that she was perfectly well and free from pain, he said, in a passion, "Why, Amy, you are surely a Johanna Southcott, and never mean to be confined at all." This was certainly very cruel, though no less certainly circumstances did rather appear to justify such a suspicion!
At last, oh, blessed news for Argyle! Amy declared she felt a slight pain; but whether it proceeded from the sweet pledge of love she carried in her bosom or from what else was time to determine: and my kind readers will probably recollect that, in a like protracted case, Old Time determined against the late Marchioness of Buckingham, without the least respect to all the splendid paraphernalia which had been profusely got up for the anticipated joyful occasion. Amy, however, not being quite so stricken in years, Argyle bustled about in the joyful hopes of a speedy deliverance, and said, "No harm in sending to Dr. Merriman, and getting the knocker tied up, and a little straw laid before the door?" As to the nurse, she had been in the house for the last month!
By the time the knocker was tied up, the straw laid down, and Dr. Merriman shown upstairs into her room, Amy declared herself quite well again, and so she continued for another week.
"Good Lord deliver us!" exclaimed Argyle.
"Amen!" responded the old nurse: for who would differ from a duke, however pleasant it might be to enjoy present pay and good quarters for doing nothing!
I cannot help pitying anything in labour, even a mountain! At length, Amy herself really experienced the so often anticipated pains. She now declared that she could not stand it, and would not, that was more!
"Give me a pair of scissors!" said she in a fury to the doctor, "and I will cut my own throat directly."
Dr. Merriman answered with perfect sangfroid.
Apropos! I do remember this said Dr. Merriman of Curzon-street, an apothecary, and often has he stood behind his uncle's counter to serve me when I was a child and fond of sweets, with a pennyworth of Spanish liquorice. His father was a respectable accoucheur and had the honour to bring all my respectable family into this respectable world, one by one, except my youngest sister Julia; and he would have done as much by her, but that he happened to die one day, and the present Dr. Merriman, his nephew, formerly well known by the appellation of Sam Merriman, officiated, faute de mieux, my dear mother being too shy to endure the idea of a perfect stranger.