The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves - Tobias Smollett
As he next day crossed the country, ruminating on the disaster that had
befallen his squire, and could now compare circumstances coolly, he
easily comprehended the whole scheme of that adventure, which was no
other than an artifice of Anthony Darnel and his emissaries to draw him
from the inn, where he proposed to execute his design upon the innocent
Aurelia. He took it for granted that the uncle, having been made
acquainted with his niece's elopement, had followed her track by the help
of such information as he received, from one stage to another; and that,
receiving more particulars at the White Hart touching Sir Launcelot, he
had formed the scheme in which Crabshaw was an involuntary instrument
towards the seduction of his master.
Amusing himself with these and other cogitations, our hero in the
afternoon reached the place of his destination, and, entering the inn
where Timothy had been left at sick quarters, chanced to meet the
apothecary retiring precipitately in a very unsavoury pickle from the
chamber of his patient. When he inquired about the health of his squire,
this retainer to medicine, wiping himself all the while with a napkin,
answered in manifest confusion, that he apprehended him to be in a very
dangerous way from an inflammation of the piamater, which had produced a
most furious delirium. Then he proceeded to explain, in technical terms,
the method of cure he had followed; and concluded with telling him the
poor squire's brain was so outrageously disordered, that he had rejected
all administration, and just thrown an urinal in his face.
The knight's humanity being alarmed at this intelligence, he resolved
that Crabshaw should have the benefit of further advice, and asked if
there was not a physician in the place? The apothecary, after some
interjections of hesitation, owned there was a doctor in the village, an
odd sort of a humourist; but he believed he had not much to do in the way
of his profession, and was not much used to the forms of prescription.
He was counted a scholar, to be sure, but as to his medical capacity--he
would not take upon him to say. "No matter," cried Sir Launcelot, "he
may strike out some lucky thought for the benefit of the patient, and I
desire you will call him instantly."
While the apothecary was absent on this service, our adventurer took it
in his head to question the landlord about the character of this
physician, which had been so unfavourably represented, and received the
following information:--
"For my peart, measter, I knows nothing amiss of the doctor--he's a quiet
sort of an inoffensive man; uses my house sometimes, and pays for what he
has, like the rest of my customers. They says he deals very little in
physic stuff, but cures his patients with fasting and water-gruel,
whereby he can't expect the 'pothecary to be his friend. You knows,
master, one must live, and let live, as the saying is. I must say, he,
for the value of three guineas, set up my wife's constitution in such a
manner, that I have saved within these two years, I believe, forty pounds
in 'pothecary's bills. But what of that? Every man must eat, thof at
another's expense; and I should be in a deadly hole myself if all my
customers should take it in their heads to drink nothing but water-gruel,
because it is good for the constitution. Thank God, I have as good a
constitution as e'er a man in England, but for all that, I and my whole
family bleed and purge, and take a diet-drink twice a year, by way of
serving the 'pothecary, who is a very honest man, and a very good
neighbour."
Their conversation was interrupted by the return of the apothecary with
the doctor, who had very little of the faculty in his appearance. He was
dressed remarkably plain; seemed to be turned of fifty; had a careless
air, and a sarcastical turn in his countenance. Before he entered the
sick man's chamber, he asked some questions concerning the disease; and
when the apothecary, pointing to his own head, said, "It lies all here,"
the doctor, turning to Sir Launcelot, replied, "If that be all there's
nothing in it."
Upon a more particular inquiry about the symptoms, he was told that the
blood was seemingly viscous, and salt upon the tongue; the urine
remarkably acrosaline; and the faeces atrabilious and foetid. When the
doctor said he would engage to find the same phenomena in every healthy
man of the three kingdoms, the apothecary added, that the patient was
manifestly comatous, and moreover afflicted with griping pains and
borborygmata. "A f--t for your borborygmata," cried the physician; "what
has been done?" To this question, he replied, that venesection had been
three times performed; that a vesicatory had been applied inter scapulas;
that the patient had taken occasionally of a cathartic apozem, and
between whiles, alexipharmic boluses and neutral draughts.--"Neutral,
indeed," said the doctor; "so neutral, that I'll be crucified if ever
they declare either for the patient or the disease." So saying, he
brushed into Crabshaw's chamber, followed by our adventurer, who was
almost suffocated at his first entrance. The day was close; the
window-shutters were fastened; a huge fire blazed in the chimney; thick
harateen curtains were close drawn round the bed, where the wretched
squire lay extended under an enormous load of blankets. The nurse, who
had all the exteriors of a bawd given to drink, sat stewing in this
apartment like a damned soul in some infernal bagnio; but rising when
the company entered, made her curtsies with great decorum.--"Well," said
the doctor, "how does your patient, nurse?"--"Blessed be God for it, I
hope in a fair way. To be sure his apozem has had a blessed effect--
five-and-twenty stools since three o'clock in the morning. But then,
a'would not suffer the blisters to be put upon his thighs. Good lack!
a'has been mortally obstropolous, and out of his senses all this blessed
day."--"You lie," cried the squire, "I an't out of my seven senses, thof
I'm half mad with vexation."
The doctor having withdrawn the curtain, the hapless squire appeared very
pale and ghastly; and having surveyed his master with a rueful aspect,
addressed him in these words: "Sir Knight, I beg a boon. Be pleased to
tie a stone about the neck of the apothecary, and a halter about the neck
of the nurse, and throw the one into the next river, and the other over
the next tree, and in so doing you will do a charitable deed to your
fellow-creatures; for he and she do the devil's work in partnership, and
have sent many a score of their betters home to him before their time."
--"Oh, he begins to talk sensibly."--"Have a good heart," said the
physician. "What is your disorder?"--"Physic."--"What do you chiefly
complain of?"--"The doctor."--"Does your head ache?"--"Yea, with
impertinence." "Have you a pain in your back?"--"Yes, where the blister
lies."--"Are you sick at stomach?"--"Yes, with hunger."--"Do you feel any
shiverings?"--"Always at sight of the apothecary."--"Do you perceive any
load in your bowels?"--"I would the apothecary's conscience was as
clear."--"Are you thirsty?"--"Not thirsty enough to drink barley-water."
--"Be pleased to look into his fauces," said the apothecary; "he has got
a rough tongue, and a very foul mouth, I'll assure you."--"I have known
that the case with some limbs of the faculty, where they stood more in
need of correction than of physic.--Well, my honest friend, since you
have already undergone the proper purgations in due form, and say you
have no other disease than the doctor, we will set you on your legs again
without further question. Here, nurse, open that window, and throw these
phials into the street. Now lower the curtain, without shutting the
casement, that the man may not be stifled in his own steam. In the next
place, take off two-thirds of these coals, and one-third of these
blankets.--How dost feel now, my heart?" "I should feel heart-whole, if
so be as yow would throw the noorse a'ter the bottles, and the 'pothecary
a'ter the noorse, and oorder me a pound of chops for my dinner, for I be
so hoongry, I could eat a horse behind the saddle."
The apothecary, seeing what passed, retired of his own accord, holding up
his hands in sign of astonishment. The nurse was dismissed in the same
breath. Crabshaw rose, dressed himself without assistance, and made a
hearty meal on the first eatable that presented itself to view. The
knight passed the evening with the physician, who, from his first
appearance, concluded he was mad; but, in the course of the conversation,
found means to resign that opinion without adopting any other in lieu of
it, and parted with him under all the impatience of curiosity. The
knight, on his part, was very well entertained with the witty sarcasms
and erudition of the doctor, who appeared to be a sort of cynic
philosopher tinctured with misanthropy, and at open war with the whole
body of apothecaries, whom however it was by no means his interest to
disoblige.
Next day, Crabshaw, being to all appearance perfectly recovered, our
adventurer reckoned with the apothecary, paid the landlord, and set out
on his return for the London road, resolving to lay aside his armour at
some distance from the metropolis; for, ever since his interview with
Aurelia, his fondness for chivalry had been gradually abating. As the
torrent of his despair had disordered the current of his sober
reflection, so now, as that despair subsided, his thoughts began to flow
deliberately in their ancient channel. All day long he regaled his
imagination with plans of connubial happiness, formed on the possession
of the incomparable Aurelia; determined to wait with patience, until the
law should supersede the authority of her guardian, rather than adopt any
violent expedient which might hazard the interest of his passion.
He had for some time travelled in the turnpike road, when his reverie was
suddenly interrupted by a confused noise; and when he lifted up his eyes
he beheld at a little distance a rabble of men and women, variously armed
with flails, pitchforks, poles, and muskets, acting offensively against a
strange figure on horseback, who, with a kind of lance, laid about him
with incredible fury. Our adventurer was not so totally abandoned by the
spirit of chivalry, to see without emotion a single knight in danger of
being overpowered by such a multitude of adversaries. Without staying to
put on his helmet, he ordered Crabshaw to follow him in the charge
against those plebeians. Then couching his lance, and giving Bronzomarte
the spur, he began his career with such impetuosity as overturned all
that happened to be in his way; and intimidated the rabble to such a
degree, that they retired before him like a flock of sheep, the greater
part of them believing he was the devil in propria persona. He came in
the very nick of time to save the life of the other errant, against whom
three loaded muskets were actually levelled, at the very instant that our
adventurer began his charge. The unknown knight was so sensible of the
seasonable interposition, that, riding up to our hero, "Brother," said
he, "this is the second time you have holp me off, when I was bump
ashore.--Bess Mizzen, I must say, is no more than a leaky bum-boat, in
comparison of the glorious galley you want to man. I desire that
henceforth we may cruise in the same latitudes, brother; and I'll be
d--ned if I don't stand by you as long as I have a stick standing, or can
carry a rag of canvas."
By this address our knight recognised the novice Captain Crowe, who had
found means to accommodate himself with a very strange suit of armour.
By way of helmet, he wore one of the caps used by the light horse, with
straps buckled under his chin, and contrived in such a manner as to
conceal his whole visage, except the eyes. Instead of cuirass, mail,
greaves, and other pieces of complete armour, he was cased in a
postillion's leathern jerkin, covered with thin plates of tinned iron.
His buckler was a potlid, his lance a hop-pole shod with iron, and a
basket-hilt broadsword, like that of Hudibras, depended by a broad buff
belt, that girded his middle. His feet were defended by jack-boots, and
his hands by the gloves of a trooper. Sir Launcelot would not lose time
in examining particulars, as he perceived some mischief had been done,
and that the enemy had rallied at a distance; he therefore commanded
Crowe to follow him, and rode off with great expedition; but he did not
perceive his squire was taken prisoner; nor did the captain recollect
that his nephew, Tom Clarke, had been disabled and secured in the
beginning of the fray. The truth is, the poor captain had been so
belaboured about the pate, that it was a wonder he remembered his own
name.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CONTAINING ADVENTURES OF CHIVALRY EQUALLY NEW AND SURPRISING.
The knight Sir Launcelot, and the novice Crowe, retreated with equal
order and expedition to the distance of half a league from the field of
battle, where the former, halting, proposed to make a lodgment in a very
decent house of entertainment, distinguished by the sign of St. George of
Cappadocia encountering the dragon, an achievement in which temporal and
spiritual chivalry were happily reconciled. Two such figures alighting
at the inn gate did not pass through the yard unnoticed and unadmired by
the guests and attendants, some of whom fairly took to their heels, on
the supposition that these outlandish creatures were the avant-couriers
or heralds of a French invasion. The fears and doubts, however, of those
who ventured to stay were soon dispelled, when our hero accosted them in
the English tongue, and with the most courteous demeanour desired to be
shown into an apartment.
Had Captain Crowe been spokesman, perhaps their suspicions would not have
so quickly subsided, for he was, in reality, a very extraordinary novice,
not only in chivalry, but also in his external appearance, and
particularly in those dialects of the English language which are used by
the terrestrial animals of this kingdom. He desired the ostler to take
his horse in tow, and bring him to his moorings in a safe riding. He
ordered the waiter, who showed them into a parlour, to bear a hand, ship
his oars, mind his helm, and bring alongside a short allowance of brandy
or grog, that he might cant a slug into his bread-room, for there was
such a heaving and pitching, that he believed he should shift his
ballast. The fellow understood no part of this address but the word
brandy, at mention of which he disappeared. Then Crowe, throwing himself
into an elbow chair, "Stop my hawse-holes," cried he, "I can't think
what's the matter, brother; but, egad, my head sings and simmers like a
pot of chowder. My eyesight yaws to and again, d'ye see; then there's
such a walloping and whushing in my hold--smite me--Lord have mercy upon
us. Here, you swab, ne'er mind the glass, hand me the noggin."
The latter part of this address was directed to the waiter, who had
returned with a quartern of brandy, which Crowe, snatching eagerly,
started into his bread-room at one cant. Indeed, there was no time to be
lost, inasmuch as he seemed to be on the verge of fainting away when he
swallowed this cordial, by which he was instantaneously revived.
He then desired the servant to unbuckle the straps of his helmet, but
this was a task which the drawer could not perform, even though assisted
with the good offices of Sir Launcelot, for the head and jaws were so
much swelled with the discipline they had undergone, that the straps and
buckles lay buried, as it were, in pits formed by the tumefaction of the
adjacent parts.
Fortunately for the novice, a neighbouring surgeon passed by the door on
horseback, a circumstance which the waiter, who saw him from the window,
no sooner disclosed, than the knight had recourse to his assistance.
This practitioner having viewed the whole figure, and more particularly
the head of Crowe, in silent wonder, proceeded to feel his pulse, and
then declared, that as the inflammation was very great, and going on with
violence to its acme, it would be necessary to begin with copious
phlebotomy, and then to empty the intestinal canal. So saying, he began
to strip the arm of the captain, who perceiving his aim, "Avast,
brother," cried he, "you go the wrong way to work; you may as well
rummage the afterhold when the damage is in the forecastle; I shall right
again when my jaws are unhooped."
With these words he drew a clasp-knife from his pocket, and, advancing to
a glass, applied it so vigorously to the leathern straps of his
headpiece, that the gordian knot was cut, without any other damage to his
face than a moderate scarification, which, added to the tumefaction of
features naturally strong, and a whole week's growth of a very bushy
beard, produced on the whole a most hideous caricatura. After all, there
was a necessity for the administration of the surgeon, who found divers
contusions on different parts of the skull, which even the tin cap had
not been able to protect from the weapons of the rustics.
These being shaved and dressed secundum artem, and the operator dismissed
with a proper acknowledgment, our knight detached one of the post-boys to
the field of action for intelligence concerning Mr. Clarke and squire
Timothy, and, in the interim, desired to know the particulars of Crowe's
adventures since he parted from him at the White Hart.
A connected relation, in plain English, was what he had little reason to
expect from the novice, who, nevertheless, exerted his faculties to the
uttermost for his satisfaction. He give him to understand, that in
steering his course to Birmingham, where he thought of fitting himself
with tackle, he had fallen in, by accident, at a public-house, with an
itinerant tinker, in the very act of mending a kettle; that, seeing him
do his business like an able workman, he had applied to him for advice,
and the tinker, after having considered the subject, had undertaken to
make him such a suit of armour as neither sword nor lance should
penetrate; that they adjourned to the next town, where the leather coat,
the plates of tinned iron, the lance, and the broadsword, were purchased,
together with a copper saucepan, which the artist was now at work upon in
converting it to a shield; but in the meantime, the captain, being
impatient to begin his career of chivalry, had accommodated himself with
a pot-lid, and taken to the highway, notwithstanding all the entreaties,
tears, and remonstrances of his nephew, Tom Clarke, who could not however
be prevailed upon to leave him in the dangerous voyage he had undertaken.
That this being but the second day of his journey, he descried five or
six men on horseback bearing up full in his teeth, upon which he threw
his sails aback, and prepared for action; that he hailed them at a
considerable distance, and bade them bring to; when they came alongside,
notwithstanding his hail, he ordered them to clew up their courses, and
furl their topsails, otherwise he would be foul of their quarters; that,
hearing this salute, they luffed all at once, till their cloth shook in
the wind; then he hallooed in a loud voice, that his sweetheart, Besselia
Mizzen, were the broad pendant of beauty, to which they must strike their
topsails on pain of being sent to the bottom; that, after having eyed him
for some time with astonishment, they clapped on all their sails, some of
them running under his stern, and others athwart his forefoot, and got
clear off; that, not satisfied with running ahead, they all of a sudden
tacked about, and one of them boarding him on the lee-quarter, gave him
such a drubbing about his upper works, that the lights danced in his
lanterns; that he returned the salute with his hop-pole so effectually
that his aggressor broached to in the twinkling of a handspike, and then
he was engaged with all the rest of the enemy, except one, who sheered
off, and soon returned with a mosquito fleet of small craft, who had done
him considerable damage, and, in all probability, would have made prize
of him, had n't he been brought off by the knight's gallantry. He said,
that in the beginning of the conflict Tom Clarke rode up to the foremost
of the enemy, as he did suppose in order to prevent hostilities, but
before he got up to him near enough to hold discourse, he was pooped with
a sea that almost sent him to the bottom, and then towed off he knew not
whither.
Crowe had scarce finished his narration, which consisted of broken hints
and unconnected explosions of sea terms, when a gentleman of the
neighbourhood, who acted in the commission of the peace, arrived at the
gate, attended by a constable, who had in custody the bodies of Thomas
Clarke and Timothy Crabshaw, surrounded by five men on horseback, and an
innumerable posse of men, women, and children, on foot. The captain, who
always kept a good look-out, no sooner descried this cavalcade and
procession, than he gave notice to Sir Launcelot, and advised that they
should crowd away with all the cloth they could carry. Our adventurer
was of another opinion, and determined, at any rate, to procure the
enlargement of the prisoners.
The justice, ordering his attendants to stay without the gate, sent his
compliments to Sir Launcelot Greaves, and desired to speak with him for a
few minutes. He was immediately admitted, and could not help staring at
sight of Crowe, who, by this time, had no remains of the human
physiognomy, so much was the swelling increased and the skin discoloured.
The gentleman, whose name was Mr. Elmy, having made a polite apology for
the liberty he had taken, proceeded to unfold his business. He said,
information had been lodged with him, as a justice of the peace, against
two armed men on horseback, who had stopped five farmers on the king's
highway, put them in fear and danger of their lives, and even assaulted,
maimed, and wounded divers persons, contrary to the king's peace, and in
violation of the statute; that, by the description, he supposed the
knight and his companion to be the persons against whom the complaint had
been lodged; and, understanding his quality from Mr. Clarke, whom he had
known in London, he was come to wait upon him, and, if possible, effect
an accommodation.
Our adventurer having thanked him for the polite and obliging manner in
which he proceeded, frankly told him the whole story, as it had been just
related by the captain; and Mr. Elmy had no reason to doubt the truth of
the narrative, as it confirmed every circumstance which Clarke had before
reported. Indeed, Tom had been very communicative to this gentleman, and
made him acquainted with the whole history of Sir Launcelot Greaves, as
well as with the whimsical resolution of his uncle, Captain Crowe. Mr.
Elmy now told the knight, that the persons whom the captain had stopped
were farmers, returning from a neighbouring market, a set of people
naturally boorish, and at that time elevated with ale to an uncommon
pitch of insolence; that one of them, in particular, called Prickle, was
the most quarrelsome fellow in the whole county; and so litigious, that
he had maintained above thirty lawsuits, in eight-and-twenty of which he
had been condemned in costs. He said the others might be easily
influenced in the way of admonition; but there was no way of dealing with
Prickle, except by the form and authority of the law. He therefore
proposed to hear evidence in a judicial capacity, and his clerk being in
attendance, the court was immediately opened in the knight's apartment.
By this time Mr. Clarke had made such good use of his time in explaining
the law to his audience, and displaying the great wealth and unbounded
liberality of Sir Launcelot Greaves, that he had actually brought over to
his sentiments the constable and the commonalty, tag-rag, and bob-tail,
and even staggered the majority of the farmers, who, at first, had
breathed nothing but defiance and revenge. Farmer Stake being first
called to the bar, and sworn touching the identity of Sir Launcelot
Greaves and Captain Crowe, declared, that the said Crowe had stopped him
on the king's highway, and put him in bodily fear; that he afterwards saw
the said Crowe with a pole or weapon, value threepence, breaking the
king's peace, by committing assault and battery against the heads and
shoulders of his majesty's liege subjects, Geoffrey Prickle, Hodge Dolt,
Richard Bumpkin, Mary Fang, Catherine Rubble, and Margery Litter; and
that he saw Sir Launcelot Greaves, Baronet, aiding, assisting, and
comforting the said Crowe, contrary to the king's peace, and against the
form of the statute.
Being asked if the defendant, when he stopped them, demanded their money,
or threatened violence, he answered he could not say, inasmuch as the
defendant spoke in an unknown language. Being interrogated if the
defendant did not allow them to pass without using any violence, and if
they did not pass unmolested, the deponent replied in the affirmative.
Being required to tell for what reason they returned, and if the
defendant Crowe was not assaulted before he began to use his weapon, the
deponent made no answer. The depositions of farmer Bumpkin and Muggins,
as well as of Madge Litter and Mary Fang, were taken to much the same
purpose; and his worship earnestly exhorted them to an accommodation,
observing, that they themselves were in fact the aggressors, and that
Captain Crowe had done no more than exerted himself in his own defence.