nt _possibility_. Ah, here is Magrath to tell us the condition
of his patient."

The surgeon of the Plantagenet entering the room, at that moment, the
conversation was instantly changed.

"Well, Magrath," said Sir Gervaise, stopping suddenly in his
quarter-deck pace; "what news of the poor man?"

"He is reviving, Admiral Oakes," returned the phlegmatic surgeon; "but
it is like the gleaming of sunshine that streams through clouds, as the
great luminary sets behind the hills--"

"Oh! hang your poetry, doctor; let us have nothing but plain
matter-of-fact, this morning."

"Well, then, Sir Gervaise, as commander-in-chief, you'll be obeyed, I
think. Sir Wycherly Wychecombe is suffering under an attack of
apoplexy--or [Greek: apoplexis], as the Greeks had it. The diagnosis of
the disease is not easily mistaken, though it has its affinities as well
as other maladies. The applications for gout, or _arthritis_--sometimes
produce apoplexy; though one disease is seated in the head, while the
other usually takes refuge in the feet. Ye'll understand this the more
readily, gentlemen, when ye reflect that as a thief is chased from one
hiding-place, he commonly endeavours to get into another. I much misgive
the prudence of the phlebotomy ye practised among ye, on the first
summons to the patient."

"What the d---l does the man mean by phlebotomy?" exclaimed Sir
Gervaise, who had an aversion to medicine, and knew scarcely any of the
commonest terms of practice, though expert in bleeding.

"I'm thinking it's what you and Admiral Bluewater so freely administer
to His Majesty's enemies, whenever ye fall in with 'em at
sea;--he-he-he--" answered Magrath, chuckling at his own humour; which,
as the quantity was small, was all the better in quality.

"Surely he does not mean powder and shot! We give the French shot; Sir
Wycherly has not been shot?"

"Varra true, Sir Gervaise, but ye've let him blood, amang ye: a measure
that has been somewhat precipitately practised, I've my misgivings!"

"Now, any old woman can tell us better than that, doctor. Blood-letting
is the every-day remedy for attacks of this sort."

"I do not dispute the dogmas of elderly persons of the other sex, Sir
Gervaise, or your _every-day remedia_. If 'every-day' doctors would save
life and alleviate pain, diplomas would be unnecessary; and we might,
all of us, practise on the principle of the 'de'el tak' the hindmaist,'
as ye did yoursel', Sir Gervaise, when ye