d the
first symptom he gave of returning health was one day at dinner at the
"Plough," by astonishing two or three scarlet-coated swells, who as
usual were disporting themselves in the coffee-room, by bellowing to the
waiter for some Talli-ho "sarce" to his fish. Before this he had never
once spoken of his favourite diversion, and the sportsmen cantered by
the window to cover in the morning, and back in the afternoon, without
eliciting a single observation from him. The morning after this change
for the better, he addressed his companion at breakfast as follows:
"Blow me tight, Mr. York, if I arn't regularly renowated. I'm as fresh
as an old hat after a shower of rain. I really thinks I shall get over
this terrible illness, for I dreamt of 'unting last night, and, if
you've a mind, we'll go and see my Lord Segrave's reynard dog, and then
start from this 'ere corrupt place, for, you see, it's nothing but a
town, and what's the use of sticking oneself in a little pokey lodging
like this 'ere, where there really is not room to swing a cat, and
paying the deuce knows how much tin, too, when one has a splendid house
in Great Coram Street going on all the time, with a rigler establishment
of servants and all that sort of thing. Now, you knows, I doesn't grudge
a wisit to Margate, though that's a town too, but then, you see, one has
the sea to look at, whereas here, it's nothing but a long street with
shops, not so good as those in Red Lion Street, with a few small streets
branching off from it, and as to the prommenard, as they calls it, aside
the spa, with its trees and garden stuff, why, I'm sure, to my mind, the
Clarence Gardens up by the Regent's Park, are quite as fine. It's true
the doctor says I must remain another fortnight to perfect the cure, but
then them 'ere M.D.'s, or whatever you calls them, are such rum jockeys,
and I always thinks they say one word for the patient and two for
themselves. Now, my chap said, I must only take half a bottle o' black
strap a day at the werry most, whereas I have never had less than a
whole one--his half first, as I say, and my own after--and because I
tells him I take a pint, he flatters himself his treatment is capital,
and that he is a wonderful M.D.; but as a man can't be better than well,
I think we'll just see what there's to be seen in the neighbourhood, and
then cut our sticks, and, as I said before, I should like werry much to
see my Lord Segrave's hounds, in order that I ma