hat my plan had
not put the government to more than three hundred pound expense, and had
produced none of the ill consequences above mentioned; but, lastly, had
actually suppressed the evil for a time, and had plainly pointed out the
means of suppressing it for ever. This I would myself have undertaken,
had my health permitted, at the annual expense of the above-mentioned
sum.

After having stood the terrible six weeks which succeeded last
Christmas, and put a lucky end, if they had known their own interests,
to such numbers of aged and infirm valetudinarians, who might have
gasped through two or three mild winters more, I returned to town in
February, in a condition less despaired of by myself than by any of my
friends. I now became the patient of Dr. Ward, who wished I had taken
his advice earlier. By his advice I was tapped, and fourteen quarts
of water drawn from my belly. The sudden relaxation which this caused,
added to my enervate, emaciated habit of body, so weakened me that
within two days I was thought to be falling into the agonies of death. I
was at the worst on that memorable day when the public lost Mr. Pelham.
From that day I began slowly, as it were, to draw my feet out of the
grave; till in two months' time I had again acquired some little degree
of strength, but was again full of water. During this whole time I took
Mr. Ward's medicines, which had seldom any perceptible operation. Those
in particular of the diaphoretic kind, the working of which is thought
to require a great strength of constitution to support, had so little
effect on me, that Mr. Ward declared it was as vain to attempt sweating
me as a deal board. In this situation I was tapped a second time. I had
one quart of water less taken from me now than before; but I bore all
the consequences of the operation much better. This I attributed greatly
to a dose of laudanum prescribed by my surgeon. It first gave me the
most delicious flow of spirits, and afterwards as comfortable a nap.

The month of May, which was now begun, it seemed reasonable to
expect would introduce the spring, and drive of that winter which yet
maintained its footing on the stage. I resolved therefore to visit a
little house of mine in the country, which stands at Ealing, in the
county of Middlesex, in the best air, I believe, in the whole kingdom,
and far superior to that of Kensington Gravel-pits; for the gravel is
here much wider and deeper, the place higher and more op