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der incident to humanity, against which our advertising doctors are not possessed with a most infalJible antidote. The professors of other arts confess the inevitable intricacy of things; talk with doubt, and decide with hesitation: but doubting is entirely unknown in medicine: the advertising professors here delight in cases of difficulty; be the disorder ever so desperate or radical, you will find numbers in every street, who, by levelling a pill at the part affected, promise a certain cure without loss of time, knowledge of a bedfellow, or hinderance of business.

When I consider the assiduity of this profession, their benevolence amazes me. They not only, in general, give their medicines for half-value, but use the most persuasive remonstrances to induce the sick to come and be cured. Sure there must be something strangely obstinate in an English patient, who refuses so much health upon such easy terms! Does he take a pride in being bloated with a dropsy does he find pleasure in the alternations of an intermittent fever? or feel as much satisfaction in nursing up his gout, as he found pleasure in acquir ing it? He must, otherwise he would never reject such repeated assurances of instant relief. What can be more convincing than the manner in which the sick are invited to be well? The doctor first begs the most earnest attention of the public to what he is going to propose; he solemnly affirms the pill was never found to want success; he produces a list of those who have been rescued from the grave by taking it. Yet, notwithstanding all this, there are many here who now and then think proper to be sick-only sick did I say? there are some who even think proper to die! Yes, by the head of Confucius, they die! though they might

have purchased the health-restoring specific for half a-crown at every corner.

I can never enough admire the sagacity of this country for the encouragement given to the professors of this art; with what indulgence does she foster up those of her own growth, and kindly cherish those that come from abroad! Like a skilful gardener, she invites them from every foreign climate to herself. Here every great exotic strikes as soon as imported, and feels the genial beam of favour; while the mighty metropolis, like one vast munificent dunghill, receives them indiscriminately to her breast, and supplies each other with more than native nourishment.

In other countries, the physician pretends to cure disorders in the lump; the same doctor who com bats the gout in the toe, shall pretend to prescribe for a pain in the head; and he who at one time cures a consumption, shall at another give drugs for a dropsy. How absurd and ridiculous; this is, being a mere jack of all trades. Is the animal machine less complicated than a brass pin? Not less than ten different hands are required to make a brass pin; and shall the body be set right by one single operator?

The English are sensible of the force of this reasoning; they have therefore one doctor for the eyes, another for the toes; they have their sciatica doc. tors, and inoculating doctors; they have one doctor who is modestly content with securing them from bug-bites, and five hundred who prescribe for the bite of mad dogs.

But as nothing pleases curiosity more than anecdotes of the great, however minute or trifling, I must present yon, inadequate as my abilities are to the subject, with an account of one or two of

those personages who lead in this honourable pro

fession.

The first upon the list of glory is doctor Richard Rock, F.U.N. This great man is short of stature, is fat, and waddles as he walks. He always wears a white three-tailed wig, nicely combed, and frizled upon each cheek. Sometimes he carries a cane, but a hat never: it is indeed very remarkable that this extraordinary personage should never wear a hat; but so it is, a hat he never wears. He is usu ally drawn, at the top of his own bills, sitting in his arm-chair, holding a little bottle between his finger and thumb, and surrounded with rotten teeth, nippers, pills, packets, and gallipots. No man can promise fairer or better than he; for, as he observes, Pe your disorder never so far gone, be under no uneasiness, make yourself quite easy, I can cure you.'

The next in fame, though by some reckoned of equal pretensions, is doctor Timothy Franks, F.O. G.H. living in the Old Bailey. As Rock is remarkably squab, his great rival Franks is as remarkably tall. He was born in the year of the Christian æra 1692, and is, while I now write, ex. actly sixty-eight years three months and four days. old. Age, however, has no ways impaired his usual health and vivacity; I am told he generally walks with his breast open. This gentleman, who is of a mixed reputation, is particularly remarkable for a becoming assurance, which carries him gently through life: for, except doctor Rock, none are more blessed with the advantages of face than Dr. Franks.

And yet the great have their foibles as well as the little. I am almost ashamed to mention it. Let the foibles of the great rest in peace. Yet I

must impart the whole. These two great men are actually now at variance; like mere men, mere common mortals.-Rock advises the world to be ware of bog-trotting quacks; Franks retorts the wit and the sarcasm, by fixing on his rival the odious appellation of Dumpling Dick. He calls the serious doctor Rock, Dumpling Dick! Head of Confucius, what profanation! Dumpling Dick! What a pity, ye powers, that the learned, who were born. mutually to assist in enlightening the world, should thus differ among themselves, and make even the profession ridiculous! Sure the world is wide enough, at least, for two great personages to figure in: men of science should leave controversy to the little world below them; and then we might see Rock and Franks walking together, hand in hand, smiling onward to immortality.

ADVENTURES OF A STROLLING PLAYER.

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AM fond of amusement, in whatever company it is to be found; and wit, though dressed in rags, is very pleasing to me. I went some days ago to take a walk in St. James's Park, about the hour in which company leave it to go to dinner. There were but few in the walks, and those who staid seemed by their looks rather more willing to forget that they had an appetite, than gain one. I sat down on one of the benches, at the other end of which was seated a man in very shabby clothes.

We continued to groan, to hem, and to cough, as usual upon such occasions; and, at last, ventured

upon conversation. ' I beg pardon, sir,' cried I, but I think I have seen you before; your face is familiar to me. Yes, sir,' replied he, I have a good familiar face, as my friends tell me.

well known in every town in England as the dromedary, or live crocodile. You must understand, sir, that I have been these sixteen years merry-andrew to a puppet-show: last Bartholomew-fair my master and I quarrelled, beat each other, and parted; he to sell his puppets to the pincushion-makers in Rosemary-lane, and I to starve in St. James's-Park.'

I am sorry, sir, that a person of your appearance should labour under any difficulties.' O sir,' returned he, my appearance is very much at your service; but, though I cannot boast of eating much, yet there are few that are merrier: if I had twenty thousand-a-year I should be merry; and, thank the Fates, though not worth a groat, I am very merry still. If I have three-pence in my pocket, I never refuse to be my three half-pence; and, if I have no money, I never scorn to be treated by any that are kind enough to pay my reckoning. What think you, sir, of a steak and a tankard! You shall treat me now, and I will treat you again when I find you in the Park in love with eating, and with. out money to pay for a dinner:'

As I never refuse a small expense for the sake of a merry companion, we instantly adjourned to a neighbouring ale-house, and, in a few moments, had a frothing tankard, and a smoking steak, spread on the table before us. It is impossible to express how much the sight of such good cheer improved my companion's vivacity. I like this dinner, sir,' says he, for three reasons: first, because I am naturally fond of beef; secondly, because I am hun. gry; and, thirdly and lastly, because I get it for

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