“Nay, I was but thinking—a physician must needs consider these things—that a county gentleman, with so great an estate, would be indeed a windfall in such an establishment as mine.”
“Why, doctor, would you have all the world mad?”
“They are already,” he replied; “as mad as March hares—all of them. I would only have them in establishments, with strait-waistcoats on, and an experienced and humane physician to reduce them by means of—those measures which are never known to fail.”
“I hope,” I said seriously, because I began to fear that some violence might have been used, “that my poor friend has been treated gently.”
“We never,” replied the doctor, “treat them otherwise than gently. My fellows understand that this—ahem!—unfortunate escaped sufferer from lunacy or dementia (because I have not yet had time to diagnose his case with precision) is to be treated with singular forbearance. One or two cuffs on the head, an admonition by means of a keeper’s boot, he hath doubtless received. These things are absolutely necessary: but no collar-bones put out or ribs broken. In the case of violent patients, ribs, as a rule, do get broken, and give trouble in the setting. Your friend, young lady, has all his bones whole. No discipline, so far, has been administered beyond a few buckets of water, which it was absolutely necessary to pour over his head, out of common humanity, and in order to calm the excessive rage into which the poor gentleman fell. He is quite calm now, and has neither been put under the pump nor in the tank. I have expressly ordered that there is to be no cudgelling. And I have promised my fellows half-a-guinea apiece”—here he looked at me with a meaning smile—“if they are gentle with him. I have told them that there is a young lady interested in his welfare. My keepers, I assure you, madam, have rough work to do, but they are the most tender-hearted of men. Otherwise, they would be sent packing. And at the sight of half-a-guinea, their hearts yearn with affection towards the patients.”
I smiled, and promised the half-guineas on the liberation of the prisoner. Cuffs and kicks! a few buckets of cold water! a strait-waistcoat! My poor Harry! surely this would be enough to cure any man of his passion. And what a fitting end to a journey commenced with the intention of killing and murdering your old playfellow’s lover! Yet, to be sure, it was a wicked thing I had done, and I resolved to lose no time (as soon as there was no longer any fear of a duel) in beginning to repent.
All this accomplished, which was, after all, only a beginning, I left the house and walked up the hill, intending to find the three gentlemen waiting for their duel. These meetings generally took place, I knew, on the way to the old well. I left Durdans on the right, and struck across the turf to the left. Presently I saw before me a group of three gentlemen, standing together and talking. That is to say, two were talking, and one, Lord Chudleigh, was standing apart. They saw me presently, and I heard Sir Miles, in his loud and hearty voice, crying out: “Gad so! It is pretty Kitty herself.”
“You look, gentlemen,” I said, “as if you were expecting quite another person. But pray, Sir Miles, why on the Downs so early? There is no race to-day, nor any bull-baiting. The card-room is open, and I believe the inns are not shut.”
“We are here,” he replied, unblushingly, “to take the air. It is bracing: it is good for the complexion: it expands the chest and opens the breathing pipes: it is as good as a draught of the waters: and as stimulating as a bottle of port.”