DECEMBER 285 



though the use of the catheter, the probe, the dioptra, 

 and the forceps, all known to practitioners in classical 

 times, had been forgotten, anybody could handle knife 

 and saw. Therefore the directions are of the simplest how 

 to proceed ' if thou wilt carve off or lop off a limb from 

 a body ' [gif thu wille lim aceorvan othe asnithan]. 



From time to time one stumbles on a bit of sound and 

 solid sense, as when the writer is prescribing remedies for 

 loss of appetite a terrible calamity to overtake people 

 from whom we derive our own unrivalled proficiency with 

 knife and fork. A Saxon lord who refused his victuals 

 must indeed, it was thought, be in parlous case probably 

 possessed of a devil or two ; consequently a great variety 

 of recipes are given to restore the appetite, among them 

 one which looks curiously modern 'Let them seek for 

 themselves fatigue in riding on horseback, or in a wain as 

 much as they can endure.' Carriage exercise in a spring- 

 less wain meant a more rigorous experience than a drive 

 in Hyde Park on rubber tyres. 



After all, the leeches of those days may not have been 

 such fools as we are inclined to pronounce them. They 

 wrote very foolish prescriptions, and some very nasty 

 ones, but how much of them all did they believe? Is 

 there any fashionable physician in London at this moment 

 who will declare on his honour that he relies as much on 

 the resources of the pharmacopoeia as on the faith of his 

 patients ? How many modern doctors have the courage, 

 when they recommend regimen rather than drugs, to 

 reply as the famous Jephson did to Lady Londonderry ? 

 ' Sir,' she asked, scandalised at the severe simplicity of his 

 orders, ' do you know whom you 're speaking to ? ' ' Yes, 

 ma'am; to an old woman with a disordered stomach.' 



