"I wouldn't miss it for money, Jack," declared Vivian Baskerville. "Such a clever chap as you be, and none of us ever knowed it. You ought to go for Tom Fool to the riders. I lay you'd make tons more money than ever you will to Trowlesworthy Warren."
"By the way, who is to be the Doctor?" asked Ned Baskerville. "'Twasn't settled, Mr. Masterman."
Dennis collapsed blankly.
"By Jove! No more it was," he admitted, "and I've forgotten all about it. The Doctor's very important, too. We must have him before the next rehearsal. For the present you can read it out of the book, Mark."
Mark Baskerville was prompting, and now, after St. George and the Bear had made a pretence of wrestling, and the Bear had perished with much noise and to the accompaniment of loud laughter, Mark read the Doctor's somewhat arrogant pretensions.
"All sorts of diseases—
Whatever you pleases:
The phthisic, the palsy, the gout,
If the Devil's in, I blow him out.
* * * * * * *