It is unnecessary to describe a place so well known to all lovers of the picturesque. I may hint that the far-famed view of twelve Scotch, Irish, and Welsh counties, and the Channel and the Atlantic Ocean, can still be enjoyed by those who ascend Mount MacHaggis, and that the table-d'hôte at the Royal Hibernian Hotel yet costs, with its seven courses, five-and-sixpence. And now to perform my duty.
My son, George Lewis Bolton Rollit (he is christened after some professional friends of mine, in the hope that at some distant date he may be assisted by them in the characters of good fairy godfathers in the profession to which it is hoped he may ornamentally belong), is extremely partial to sweetstuff. He is a habitual glutton of a sticky comestible known, I believe, in the confectionery trade as "Chicago Honey Shells." This toothsome (I have his word for the appropriateness of the epithet) edible he devours in large quantities, spending at times as much as five shillings to secure an ample store of an article of commerce generally bought in quantities estimated at the usually convenient rate of "two ounces for three halfpence."
It was after a long gastronomic debauch connected with Chicago Honey Shells that I noticed that George Lewis Bolton Rollit was suffering from a swollen face. My son, although evidently in great pain, declared that there was nothing the matter with him. However, as for three successive days he took only two helpings of meat and refused his pudding, I, in consultation with his mother, came to the conclusion that it was necessary to seek the advice of a local medical man. George Lewis Bolton Rollit raised objections to this course, but they were overruled.
"No, Sir, the doctor is not in. He's out for the day."
Such was the answer to my question put twice at the doors of two medical-looking houses with brass plates to match. On the second occasion I expressed so much annoyance that the servant quite sympathised with me.
"Perhaps Master Sammy might do, Sir?" suggested the kind-hearted janitor.
On finding that "Master Sammy" was a nephew of the owner of the house and a qualified medical man, I consented, and "Master Sammy" was sent for. There was some little delay in his appearance, as, although the morning was fairly well advanced, he was not up. However, after making a possibly hasty toilette, he soon appeared. No doubt he was much older, but he looked about eighteen. He was very pleasant, and listened to my history of the case. He seemed, so it appeared to me, to recognise the Chicago Honey Shells as old acquaintances. It may have been my fancy, but I think he smacked his lips when I suggested that George Lewis Bolton Rollit had probably eaten five shillings' worth at a sitting.
"You see," I said, "he has had a bad face ever since; and as our dentist in town told us about a fortnight ago that sooner or later he must have a tooth out, I think this must be the one to which he referred. Won't you see?"
When, after some persuasion, George Lewis Bolton Rollit had been induced to open his mouth, "Master Sammy" did see.
"Yes," observed the budding doctor, after he had looked into my lad's mouth as if it were a sort of curiosity from India that he was regarding for the first time, "yes, I think it ought to come out."