Note 1.-The forms in which the desire of possessing some token of remarkable persons displays itself now-a-days are abundantly amusing-witness many of the relics of those great objects of enthusiasm, whether real or affected, Lord Byron and Napoleon. It was but last summer that I had an opportunity of seeing a curious memento of a living warrior. We live near Strathfieldsaye, and a pretty young damsel, a Londoner, happening to call on me, after going to see the place which its possessor has rendered famous, produced with the most innocent and triumphant defight "a very interesting memorial of the Great Captain," which she had been fortunate enough to procure, and for whose more safe and honourable keep ing she intended, as soon as she returned home, to construct a white satin bag, embroidered in silver and perfumed with ottar of roses. Guess what this treasure might be, gentle reader!-No less than a lock of hair from the Duke of Wellington's horse's tail!

Note 2.-I cannot resist the temptation of quoting a few passages from one or two of these quaint old works, beginning, as bound in loyalty, with the dedication to "Quarles's Divine Fancies, digested into Epigrams, Meditations, and Observations. London: printed for William Meares, 1632. Dedicated to the Royall Bud of Majestie, and center of all our hopes and happiness, Prince Charles; son and Heir Apparent to the High and Mightie Charles, by the Grace of God, King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland." In which "Epistle Dedicatorie," he says: "Modell of sweetnesse, let thy busie fingers entertain this slender presente; let thy harmless smiles crowne it; when thy infancie hath crackt the shell, let thy childhood taste the kernel: meantime, while thy little hands and eyes peruse it, lugg it in thy tender arms, and lay the burthen at thy royal parent's feet. Heaven bless thy youth with grace, and crown thy days with glory; angels conduct thee from the cradle to the crown; let the English rose and French lillie flourish in thy cheeks; let the most eminent qualities of thy renowned grandfathers meet in thy princely heart-" And so forth, longer than I care to tell.

Now for a choice recipe from "The Compleat Housewife, or Accomplished Gentlewoman's Companion, with curiously engraved copper-plates. To which is added a collection of above two hundred family receipts of medicines: viz. Drinks, sirops, salves, and ointments, never before made publick. By E. S. Printed for J. Pemberton, Golden Buck, over against St. Dunstan's Church, Fleet Street, 1730." -"The Lady Hewit's cordial water:-Take red sage, betony, spear-mint, hyssop, setwell, thyme, balm, pennyroyal, celandine, water-cresses, heart's-ease, lavender, angelica, germander, cole-mint, tamarisks, colts foot, valerian, saxefrage, pimpernel, vervain, parsley, rosemary, savory, scabious, agrimony, mother-thyme, wild marjorum, Roman wormwood, carduus benedictus, pellitory of the wall, field-daisies, (flowers and leaves). Of each of these herbs take a handful, after they are picked and washed. Of rose-yarrow, comfrey, plantain, camomile, sweet marjorum, maidenhair; of each of these a handful before they are washed or picked. Red rose-leaves and cowslipflowers, of each half a peck; rosemary-flowers, a quarter of a peck; hartshorn, two ounces; juniper berries, one dram; chive roots, one ounce; comfrey roots, sliced; anniseeds, fennel-seeds, caraway-seeds, nutmegs, ginger, cinnamon, pepper, spikenards, parsley-seeds, cloves and mace; aromaticum rosarum, three drams; sassafras sliced, half an ounce; alecampane roots, melilot flowers, calamus aromaticus, cardamums, lignum vitæ, aloes, rhubarb, sliced thin. Galengal, veronica, lodericum; of these each two drams; acer bezoar, thirty grains; musk, twenty-four grains; ambergris, twenty grains; flour of coral, two drams; flour of amber, two drams; flour of pearl, two drams; half a book of leaf gold; saffron in a little bag, two drams; white sugar-candy, one pound.

Wash the herbs, and swing them in a cloth till dry: in the midst of the herbs put the seeds, spices, and drugs; which being bruised, then put the whole to steep in as much rich sherry sack of the best as will cover them. Distill them in an alembic, and pour the water into quart bottles. There never was a better cordial in cases of illness: two or three spoonfuls will almost revive from death."

Long live my Lady Hewit! Four of the giants of old could scarcely do more than shake that enormous bundle of herbs in the mainsail of a modern man-ofwar! One may imagine the bustle and importance of concocting this cordial; the number of maidens picking the herbs; the housekeeper, or perchance the family apothecary, selecting and compounding the drugs; the perfume and aroma of this splendid and right royal ceremony. Dr. Stevens's water, my Lady Allen's water, and aqua mirabilis, all deserve to be recorded; but I think my Lady Hewit's recipe the most various and imaginative.

After Lady Hewit, one small dose of Nicholas Culpepper, and I have done. It is extracted from "The English Physitian, with three hundred and sixty and nine medicines made of English herbs that were not in any impression until this; being an Astrologicophysical Discourse of the vulgar herbs of this nation; containing the complete method of preserving health, or cure himself being ill, for three-pence charge, with such things only as grow in England, they being most fit for English bodies. By Nicholas Culpepper, Gent., Student in Physic and Astrology. London: printed for Peter Cole, at the sign of the Printing Press in Cornhill, near the Royal Exchange. 1654."

N. B. This elaborate treatise was a posthumous work,-one, as appears from a most curious prefatory epistle by Mrs. Alice Culpepper, the relict of Nicholas," one out of seventy-nine books of his own making and translating, left on her hands and deposited into the hand of his and her much honoured friend Mr. Peter Cole, bookseller, at the Printing Press, near the Royal Exchange, from whom they may be expected in print at due season. Also her husband left seventeen other books completely perfected in the hand of the said Mr. Cole, for which he paid her husband in his life-time." [Jewel of a bookseller! Alas, that the race should be extinct!] "And Mr. Cole is ready and willing (on any good occasion) to show any of the said seventy-nine books, or the seventeen, to such as doubt thereof."—Inestimable Peter Cole! if he could but have communicated his faith in Nicholas Culpepper to his customers, he would have made a better bargain. I wonder how many of the said seventy-nine books or of the seventeen ever were printed? and, if printed, how many were sold?! and what the size and weight of the MSS. might be altogether?-whether one wagon would hold the huge ponderosities? or whether they would require two?

I must now, however, give a brief specimen of Nicholas's astrologico-physical treatise,-a short sample it must be, for a collection of the "Beauties of Culpepper" would be as tedious in this duodecimo age as one of his own heaviest volumes. Thus adviseth Nicholas :

"Keep your head outwardly warm. Acenstom yourself to smell hot herbs. Take a pill that heats the head at night going to bed. In the morning a de-i coction that cools the liver.-You must not think, ' courteous people, that I can spend my time in giving you examples of all diseases. These are enough to let you see as much light as you can receive without hurt. If I should set you to look upon the sun of my knowledge, you would be dazzled."

"Fortifie the body with herbs of the nature of the Lord of the Ascendant; 'tis no matter whether he be fortune or infortune in this case. Let your medicine be something anti-pathetical to the Lord of the Sixth. Let your medicine be something of the nature of the sign ascending. If the Lord of the Tenth be strong, make use of his medicine. If this cannot well be, make use of the medicines of the light of time. Be sore alwaies to fortifie the grieved part of the body by sympathetic remedies. Regard the heart. Keep it upon the wheels, because the sun is the fountain of life, and therefore those universal remedies aurum potabile and the philosopher's stone cure all diseases by fortifying the heart."

He says of the vine: "It is a most gallant tree, very sympathetical with the body of man." Of the willow: The moon owns it, and being a fine cool tree, the branches of it are very convenient to be placed in the chamber of one sick of fever." Of "wood bind, or honeysuckles: the celestial Crab claims it. It is fitting a conserve made of the flowers of it were in every gentlewoman's house: for if the lungs be afflicted by Jupiter, this is your cure."

Also, he saith: "If I were to tell a long story of medicines working by sympathy or antipathy, ye would not understand one word of it. They that are fit to make physitians will find it in my treatise." [Query-One of the seventy-nine? or of the seventeen?-the paid, or unpaid wisdom?] "All modern physitians know not what belongs to a sympathetical cure, no more than a cuckoo knows what belongs to

sharps and flats in musick; but follow the vulgar road and call it a hidden quality, because it is hid from the eyes of dunces:-and indeed none but astrologers can give reason for it,-and phisic without reason is like a pudding without fat," quoth Nicholas Culpepper. Finally, he says "He that reads this and understands what he reads, hath a jewel more worth than a diamond. This shall live when I am dead; and thus I leave it to the world, not caring a halfpenny whether they like it or dislike it. The grave equals all men; therefore shall equal me with princes, until which time an eternal Providence is over me; then the ill tongue of a prattling priest, or one who hath more tongue than wit, more pride than honesty, shall

never trouble me."

THE SURGEON'S COURTSHIP.

It seems rather paradoxical to say that a place noted for good air should be favourable to the increase and prosperity of the medical tribe; nevertheless the fact is so, certainly in this particular instance, and I suspect in many others and when the causes are looked into, the circumstance will seem less astonishing than it appears at the first glance, a good air being, as we all know, the pis aller of the physician, the place to which, when the resources of his art are exhausted, he sends his patients to recover or die, as it may happen. Sometimes they really do recover, especially if in leaving their medical attendant they also leave off medicine; but for the most part, poor things! they die just as certainly as they would have done if they had stayed at home, only that the sands run a little more rapidly in consequence of the glass being shaken: and this latter catastrophe is particularly frequent in Belford, whose much-vaunted air being, notwithstanding its vicinity to a great

river, keen, dry, and bracing, is excellently adapted for preserving health in the healthy, but very unfit for the delicate lungs of an invalid.

The place, however, has a name for salubrity; and, as sick people continue to resort to it in hopes of getting well, there is of course no lack of doctors to see them through the disease with proper decorum, cure them if they can, or let them die if so it must be. There is no lack of doctors, and still less is there a lack of skill; for although the air of Belford may be overrated, there is no mistake in the report which assigns to the medical men of the town singular kindness, attention and ability.

Thirty years ago these high professional qualities were apt to be alloyed by the mixture of a little professional peculiarity in dress and pedantry in manner. The faculty had not in those days completely dropped "the goldheaded cane;" and, in provincial towns especially, the physician was almost as distinguishable by the cut of his clothes as the clergyman by his shovel-crowned hat, or the officer by his uniform.

The two principal physicians of Belford at this period were notable exemplifications of medical costume-each might have sat for the picture of an M. D. The senior, and perhaps the more celebrated of the two, was a short, neat old gentleman, of exceedingly small proportions, somewhat withered and shrivelled, but almost as fair, and delicate, and carefully preserved, as if he had himself been of that sex of which he was the especial favouritean old lady in his own person. His dress was constantly a tight stock, shoes with buckles, brown silk stockings, and a full suit of drab; the kid gloves, with which his wrinkled white hands were at once adorned and preserved, were of the same sober hue;' and the shining bob-wig, which covered no common degree of intellect and knowledge, approached as nearly to the colour of the rest of his apparel as the difference of material would admit. His liveries might have been cut from the same piece with his own coat, and the chariot, in which he might be computed to pass one third of his time, (for he would as soon have dreamt of flying as of walking to visit his next-door neighbour,) was of a similar complexion. Such was the outer man of the shrewd and sensible Dr. Littleton. Add, that he loved a rubber, and that his manner was a little prim, a little quaint, and a little fidgety, and the portrait of the good old man will be complete.

His competitor. Dr. Granville, would have made four of Dr. Littleton, if cut into quarters. He was a tall, large, raw-boned man, who looked like a North Briton, and I believe actually came from that country, so famous for great physicians. His costume was inva riably black, surmounted by a powdered head

and a pigtail, which (for the doctor was a single man, and considered as a très-bon parti by the belles of the town) occasioned no inconsiderable number of disputes amongst the genteeler circles; some of his fair patients asserting that the powdered foretop was no other than a tie-wig, whilst the opposite party maintained that it was his own hair.

However this may be, Dr. Littleton's chestnut-coloured bob and Dr. Granville's powdered pigtail set the fashion amongst the inferior practitioners. From the dear old family apothecary-the kind and good old man, beloved even by the children whom he physicked, and regarded by the parents as one of their most valued friends-to the pert parish doctor, whom Crabbe has described so well, "all pride and business, bustle and conceit;" from the top to the bottom of the profession, every medical man in Belford wore a bob-wig or a pigtail. It was as necessary a preliminary to feeling a pulse, or writing a prescription, as a diploma; and to have cured a patient without the regular official decoration would have been a breach of decorum that nothing could excuse. Nay, so long did the prejudice last, that when some dozen years afterwards three several adventurers tried their fortune in the medical line at Belford, their respective failures were universally attributed to the absence of the proper costume; though the first was a prating fop, who relied entirely on calomel and the depleting system-an English Sangrado!-the second, a solemn coxcomb, who built altogether on stimulants-gave brandy in apoplexies, and sent his patients, persons who had always lived soberly, tipsy out of the world; and the third, a scientific Jack-of-all-trades, who passed his days in catching butterflies and stuffing birds for his museum, examining strata, and analyzing springs-detecting Cheltenham in one, Barèges in another, fancying some new-fangled chalybeate in the rusty scum of a third, and writing books on them all-whilst his business, such as it was, was left to take care of itself. To my fancy, the inside of these heads might very well account for the non-success of their proprietors; nevertheless, the good inhabitants of Belford obstinately referred their failure to the want of bob-wigs, pigtails, and hair-powder.

Now, however, times are altered altered even in Belford itself. Dr. Littleton and Dr. Granville repose with their patients in the church-yard of St. Nicholas, and their costumes are gone to the tomb of the Capulets.

Of a truth, all professional distinctions in dress are rapidly wearing away. Uniforms, it is true, still exist; but, except upon absolute duty, are seldom exhibited: and who, except my venerable friend the Rector of Hadley, ever thinks of wearing a shovel-hat?

Vide the note at the end of this story.

Amongst medical practitioners especially, all peculiarities, whether of equipage or apparel, are completely gone by. The chariot is no more necessary, except as a matter of convenience, than the gold-headed cane or the bob-wig; and our excellent friend Dr. Chard may, as it suits him, walk in the town, or ride on horseback, or drive his light open carriage in the country, without in the slightest degree impugning his high reputation, or risking his extensive practice; whilst the most skilful surgeon in Belford may be, and actually is, with equal impunity the greatest beau in the place.

There are not many handsomer or more agreeable men than Mr. Edward Foster, who the grandson by his mother's side of good old Dr. Littleton, and by his father's of the venerable apothecary, so long his friend and contemporary, and combining considerable natural talent with a first-rate scientific education-stepped, as by hereditary right, into the first connexion in Belford and its populous and opulent neighbourhood, and became almost immediately the leading surgeon of the town.

Skilful, accomplished, clever, kind,-possessing, besides his professional emoluments, an easy private fortune, and living with a very agreeable single sister in one of the best houses of the place,-Edward Foster, to say nothing of his good looks, seemed to combine within himself all the elements of popularity. His good looks too were of the best sort, resulting from a fine, manly, graceful figure, and an open, intelligent countenance, radiant with good-humour and vivacity. And very popular Edward Foster was. He had but one fault, so far as I could hear, and that was an inaptitude to fall in love. In vain did grave mammas sagely hint that a professional man could not expect to succeed unless married; in vain did jocular papas laughingly ask, how he would manage when Mr. Lyons, the young banker, had stolen his sister for a wife? Edward Foster did not marry, and did succeed; and Miss Foster became Mrs. Lyons, and the house went on as well as ever. Even the young ladies condescended as much as young ladies ought to condescend, but still Edward Foster was obdurate; and the gossips of Belford began to suspect that the heart which appeared so invulnerable must have been protected by some distant and probably too ambitious attachment from the charms of their fair towns women, and even proceeded to make inquiries as to the daughters of the varirious noble families that he attended in the neighbourhood.

Time solved the enigma; and the solution, as often happens in these cases, lay in a spot wholly unsuspected by the parties interested.

Few things are more melancholy and yet few more beautifully picturesque than the grounds of some fine old place deserted by