"How long have you been attackted?" inquired Teazle, approaching the bedside of Mrs. Longbow, and placing his fingers over the lady's pulse.
Mrs. Longbow said "it was some time during the night."
"Run out your tongue," continued Teazle.
Mrs. Longbow obeyed.
"Very bad tongue—all full'er stuff—you ain't well, Mrs. Longbow; there's a kind of collapse of the whole system, and a sort of debility going on, everywhere all over you."
Squire Longbow, who sat by, anxiously inquired what the disease was.
Teazle said it might be a sour stomach, or it might be fever, or it might be rheumatiz, or it might be the liver, or it might be that something else was out of order—or it might be the rattles.
"Dear me!" exclaimed the Squire, "the rattles—what is that?"
"The rattles," answered Teazle, "the rattles is a disease treated of in the books—Folks catch cold; the nose stops up; the throat gets sore, and there is a kind of rattling going on when they breathe, whether we can hear it or not—and that's the rattles."
Mrs. Longbow said "she hadn't got any rattles as she know'd on."