282 Comments on Corpulency. 



those about him, he dispensed with a liberal hand. Pity 

 seemed the pabulum of his life j and to exact commiseration 

 for imaginary ills, 



Which real ills, and they alone could cure, 



was the great object of his existence. He ate well, drank well, 

 slept well : but what of that? He had "weak stomach and 

 giddy head ; flying gout, wind in his veins, and water in his 

 skin, with constant crackings and burnings.'* His business 

 seemed, seeking for new causes to make himself miserable, 

 ** Your pulse is very good, Sir." — " Ay, so you say ; every- 

 body says so ! that pulse will be the death of me ; my pulse 

 deceives everybody, and my complaints are neglected because 

 I happen to have a good pulse ! " •* Your tongue, Sir, is 

 clean." *' Ay, there it is again ; you should have seen it in 

 the morning — as white as a sheet of paper." 



The valetudinary, thus, 



Rings o'er and o'er his hourly fuss. 



Observations. — It is truly said that ** qui medial vivit, mi- 

 sere vivit,^' There cannot be a more pitiable person than one 

 who exists per force of physic, flannel, and barley water — drop 

 their wine, weigh their meat, feel their pulse, examine their 

 tongue, and make all their movements and meals by the regu- 

 lation of the stop-watch. I know persons who, strange to say, 

 are sufferers from the rigid regularity with which they eat, 

 drink, and sleep. This is a city complaint, originally intro- 

 duced by some of the Hamborough Van-Dams of the last cen- 

 tury, whose movements resembled those of the figures of their 

 own Dutch clocks, equally regular, and about as lively. These 

 demi-Dutch invalids, who make the periods of eating, drinking, 

 and sleeping the chief business of life, may be considered as 

 eating valetudinarians, who never fail to put the very im- 

 portant question — " AVhat am I to eat? " This constant query 

 of invalids is very seldom satisfactorily answered. We re- 

 member Sir Richard Jebb's sad failure about muffins and boiled 

 turnips. Dr. Reynolds, who was in every respect an able prac- 

 titioner, was the most ready with his answer to this question. 

 He invariably recollected whether it was muffins, or crumpets, 

 or boiled turnips, or baked pears that he had recommended, 

 and he never allowed one or the other of these materia alimen* 



