ys at it--eh?"

"He has not been a temperate man, certainly."

"The brain, you see, clean gone--and not a particle of coating left
to the stomach; and yet what a struggle he makes--an interesting
case, isn't it?"

"It's very sad to see such an intellect so destroyed."

"Very sad, very sad indeed. How Fillgrave would have liked to have
seen this case. He is a clever man, is Fillgrave--in his way, you
know."

"I'm sure he is," said Dr Thorne.

"Not that he'd make anything of a case like this now--he's not, you
know, quite--quite--perhaps not quite up to the new time of day, if
one may say so."

"He has had a very extensive provincial practice," said Dr Thorne.

"Oh, very--very; and made a tidy lot of money too, has Fillgrave.
He's worth six thousand pounds, I suppose; now that's a good deal of
money to put by in a little town like Barchester."

"Yes, indeed."

"What I say to Fillgrave is this--keep your eyes open; one should
never be too old to learn--there's always something new worth picking
up. But, no--he won't believe that. He can't believe that any new
ideas can be worth anything. You know a man must go to the wall in
that way--eh, doctor?"

And then again they were called to their patient. "He's doing finely,
finely," said Mr Rerechild to Lady Scatcherd. "There's fair ground to
hope he'll rally; fair ground, is there not, doctor?"

"Yes; he'll rally; but how long that may last, that we can hardly
say."

"Oh, no, certainly not, certainly not--that is not with any
certainty; but still he's doing finely, Lady Scatcherd, considering
everything."

"How long will you give him, doctor?" said Mr Rerechild to his new
friend, when they were again alone. "Ten days? I dare say ten days,
or from that to a fortnight, not more; but I think he'll struggle on
ten days."

"Perhaps so," said the doctor. "I should not like to say exactly to
a day."

"No, certainly not. We cannot say exactly to a day; but I say ten
days; as for anything like a recovery, that you know--"

"Is out of the question," said Dr Thorne, gravely.

"Quite so; quite so; coating of the stomach clean gone, you know;
brain destroyed: did you observe the periporollida? I never saw
them so swelled before: now when the periporollida are swollen like
that--"

"Yes, very much; it's always the case when paralysis has been brought
about by intemperance."

"Always, always; I have remarked that always; the periporollida in
such cases are always