"Well, Magrath," said Sir Gervaise, stopping suddenly in his quarter-deck pace; "what news of the poor man?"
"He is reviving, Admiral Oakes," returned the phlegmatic surgeon; "but it is like the gleaming of sunshine that streams through clouds, as the great luminary sets behind the hills—"
"Oh! hang your poetry, doctor; let us have nothing but plain matter-of-fact, this morning."
"Well, then, Sir Gervaise, as commander-in-chief, you'll be obeyed, I think. Sir Wycherly Wychecombe is suffering under an attack of apoplexy—or [Greek: apoplêxis], as the Greeks had it. The diagnosis of the disease is not easily mistaken, though it has its affinities as well as other maladies. The applications for gout, or arthritis—sometimes produce apoplexy; though one disease is seated in the head, while the other usually takes refuge in the feet. Ye'll understand this the more readily, gentlemen, when ye reflect that as a thief is chased from one hiding-place, he commonly endeavours to get into another. I much misgive the prudence of the phlebotomy ye practised among ye, on the first summons to the patient."
"What the d—-l does the man mean by phlebotomy?" exclaimed Sir Gervaise, who had an aversion to medicine, and knew scarcely any of the commonest terms of practice, though expert in bleeding.
"I'm thinking it's what you and Admiral Bluewater so freely administer to His Majesty's enemies, whenever ye fall in with 'em at sea;—he-he-he—" answered Magrath, chuckling at his own humour; which, as the quantity was small, was all the better in quality.
"Surely he does not mean powder and shot! We give the French shot; Sir Wycherly has not been shot?"
"Varra true, Sir Gervaise, but ye've let him blood, amang ye: a measure that has been somewhat precipitately practised, I've my misgivings!"
"Now, any old woman can tell us better than that, doctor. Blood-letting is the every-day remedy for attacks of this sort."
"I do not dispute the dogmas of elderly persons of the other sex, Sir Gervaise, or your every-day remedia. If 'every-day' doctors would save life and alleviate pain, diplomas would be unnecessary; and we might, all of us, practise on the principle of the 'de'el tak' the hindmaist,' as ye did yoursel', Sir Gervaise, when ye cut and slash'd amang the Dons, in boarding El Lirio. I was there, ye'll both remember, gentlemen; and was obleeged to sew up the gashes ye made with your own irreverent and ungodly hands."