[The Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves by Tobias Smollett]@TWC D-Link bookThe Adventures of Sir Launcelot Greaves CHAPTER SIXTEEN 4/12
He therefore resolved to bridle his impatience, to proceed leisurely to London, and, instead of taking any rash step which might induce Anthony Darnel to remove his niece from that city, remain in seeming quiet until she should be settled, and her guardian returned to the country.
Aurelia had mentioned to him the name of Doctor Kawdle, and from him he expected in due time to receive the most interesting information formerly tormented with the pangs of despairing love, which had actually unsettled his understanding, he was now happily convinced that he had inspired the tender breast of Aurelia with mutual affection; and, though she was invidiously snatched from his embrace in the midst of such endearments as had wound up his soul to ecstasy and transport, he did not doubt of being able to rescue her from the power of an inhuman kinsman, whose guardianship would soon of course expire; and in the meantime he rested with the most perfect dependence on her constancy and virtue. 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.
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