Remember, my good friend, I pray,
What Anodyne is pleas'd to say."
When, in a kind of solemn croak,
The Quack, with shaking noddle, spoke.
Thus did the differing doctors fail,
Nor could their varying skill prevail:
They neither could set matters right,
Or quicken a pall'd appetite.
More weak and weak Sir Jeffery grew,
Nay, wasted to the daily view,
And, as his faithful servant found,
Between two stools he fell to ground. |
But still he smelt the sav'ry meat,
He sometimes still would eye the treat,
And praise the dish he could not eat. | } |
One day, when in a sunshine hour,
To pick a bit he felt the power,
Just as he did his knife apply
To give a slice of oyster-pie,
Whether the effort was too great
To bear the morsel to his plate;
Or if, from any other cause,
His nature made a gen'ral pause,
He gave a groan, it was his last,
And life and oyster-pies were past. |
Which of the Doctors did the deed,
The one who starv'd or he who fed,
Or whether Nature, nothing loth,
Laugh'd at the counsels of them both,
And, as they issued their commands,