ure you that the doctors in Paris, whose great
abilities I know, are mistaken as to the nature of your complaint.
You can live as long as Methuselah, my Lord Marquis, accidents only
excepted. Your lungs are as sound as a blacksmith's bellows, your
stomach would put an ostrich to the blush; but if you persist in living
at high altitude, you are running the risk of a prompt interment in
consecrated soil. A few words, my Lord Marquis, will make my meaning
clear to you.

"Chemistry," he began, "has shown us that man's breathing is a real
process of combustion, and the intensity of its action varies according
to the abundance or scarcity of the phlogistic element stored up by
the organism of each individual. In your case, the phlogistic, or
inflammatory element is abundant; if you will permit me to put it so,
you generate superfluous oxygen, possessing as you do the inflammatory
temperament of a man destined to experience strong emotions. While
you breath the keen, pure air that stimulates life in men of lymphatic
constitution, you are accelerating an expenditure of vitality already
too rapid. One of the conditions for existence for you is the heavier
atmosphere of the plains and valleys. Yes, the vital air for a man
consumed by his genius lies in the fertile pasture-lands of Germany, at
Toplitz or Baden-Baden. If England is not obnoxious to you, its misty
climate would reduce your fever; but the situation of our baths, a
thousand feet above the level of the Mediterranean, is dangerous for
you. That is my opinion at least," he said, with a deprecatory gesture,
"and I give it in opposition to our interests, for, if you act upon it,
we shall unfortunately lose you."

But for these closing words of his, the affable doctor's seeming
good-nature would have completely won Raphael over; but he was too
profoundly observant not to understand the meaning of the tone, the
look and gesture that accompanied that mild sarcasm, not to see that
the little man had been sent on this errand, no doubt, by a flock of his
rejoicing patients. The florid-looking idlers, tedious old women, nomad
English people, and fine ladies who had given their husbands the slip,
and were escorted hither by their lovers--one and all were in a plot to
drive away a wretched, feeble creature to die, who seemed unable to hold
out against a daily renewed persecution! Raphael accepted the challenge,
he foresaw some amusement to be derived from their manoeuvres.

"As