work, the younger but less perishable child was
forgotten, and my father began to talk.

"It is," said he, musingly, "a well-known thing that particular drugs
or herbs suit the body according to its particular diseases. When we are
ill, we don't open our medicine-chest at random, and take out any powder
or phial that comes to hand. The skilful doctor is he who adjusts the
dose to the malady."

"Of that there can be no doubt," quoth Captain Roland. "I remember a
notable instance of the justice of what you say. When I was in Spain,
both my horse and I fell ill at the same time: a dose was sent for each;
and by some infernal mistake, I swallowed the horse's physic, and the
horse, poor thing, swallowed mine!"

"And what was the result?" asked my father.

"The horse died!" answered Roland, mournfully, "a valuable beast, bright
bay, with a star!"

"And you?"

"Why, the doctor said it ought to have killed me; but it took a great
deal more than a paltry bottle of physic to kill a man in my regiment."

"Nevertheless, we arrive at the same conclusion," pursued my father,--"I
with my theory, you with your experience,--that the physic we take must
not be chosen haphazard, and that a mistake in the bottle may kill a
horse. But when we come to the medicine for the mind, how little do we
think of the golden rule which common-sense applies to the body!"

"Anan," said the Captain, "what medicine is there for the mind?
Shakspeare has said something on that subject, which, if I recollect
right, implies that there is no ministering to a mind diseased."

"I think not, brother; he only said physic (meaning boluses and black
draughts) would not do it. And Shakspeare was the last man to find fault
with his own art; for, verily, he has been a great physician to the
mind."

"Ah! I take you now, brother,--books again! So you think when a man
breaks his heart or loses his fortune or his daughter (Blanche, child,
come here), that you have only to clap a plaster of print on the sore
place, and all is well. I wish you would find me such a cure."

"Will you try it?"

"If it is not Greek," said my uncle.

CHAPTER V.

My Father's Crotchet On The Hygienic Chemistry Of Books.

"If," said my father,--and here his hand was deep in his waistcoat,--"if
we accept the authority of Diodorus as to the inscription on the great
Egyptian library--and I don't see why Diodorus should not be as near the
mark as any one else?" added my father i