Rob of the Bowl a legend of St. Inigoe's |
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| 16. | CHAPTER XVI. |
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 | CHAPTER XVI. Rob of the Bowl |  |
16. CHAPTER XVI.
“Who be these, sir?”
“Fellows to mount a bank. Did your instructer
In the dear tongues never discourse to you
Of the Italian mountebanks?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why here you shall see one.”
“They are quacksalvers,
Fellows that live by venting oils and drugs.”
Volpone.
The council had been summoned to meet on the
morning following that of the incidents related in the
last chapter, and the members were now accordingly
assembling, soon after breakfast, at the Proprietary
mansion. The arrival of one or two
gentlemen on horseback with their servants, added
somewhat to the bustle of the stable yard, which was
already the scene of that kind of busy idleness and
lounging occupation so agreeable to the menials of a
large establishment. Here, in one quarter, a few
noisy grooms were collected around the watering
troughs, administering the discipline of the currycomb
or the wash bucket to some half score of
courier and Willy o' the Flats, with the zeal of amateur
vagrants, were striving to cozen each other
out of their coppers at the old game of Cross and
Pile; whilst, in an opposite direction, Derrick was
exhibiting to a group of spectators, amongst whom
the young heir apparent was a prominent personage,
a new set of hawk bells just brought by the Olive
Branch from Dort, and lecturing, with a learned
gravity, upon their qualities, to the infinite edification
and delight of his youthful pupil. Slouching fox
hounds, thick-lipped mastiffs and wire-haired terriers
mingled indiscriminately amongst these groups, as if
confident of that favouritism which is the universal
privilege of the canine race amongst good tempered
persons and contented idlers all the world over.
Whilst the inhabitants of the yard were engrossed
with these occupations, a trumpet was heard at a
distance in the direction of the town. The blast
came so feebly upon the ear as, at first, to pass unregarded,
but being repeated at short intervals, and
at every repetition growing louder, it soon arrested
the general attention, and caused an inquiry from
all quarters into the meaning of so unusual an incident.
“Fore God, I think that there be an alarm of Indians
in the town!” exclaimed the falconer as he
spread his hand behind his ear and listened for some
moments, with a solemn and portentous visage.
“Look to it, lads—there may be harm afoot. Put
up thy halfpence, Dick Pagan, and run forward to
it means mischief, masters.”
“Indians!” said Willy; “Derrick's five wits have
gone on a fool's errand ever since the murder of that
family at the Zachaiah fort by the salvages. If the
Indians were coming you should hear three guns
from Master Randolph Brandt's look-out on the
Notley road. It is more likely there may be trouble
at the gaol with the townspeople, for there was a
whisper afloat yesterday concerning a rescue of the
prisoners. Troth, the fellow has a lusty breath who
blows that trumpet!”
“Ay, and the trumpet,” said Derrick, “is not
made to dance with, masters: there is war and
throat-cutting in it, or I am no true man.”
During this short exchange of conjectures, Dick
Pagan had hastened to the gate which opened towards
the town, and mounting the post, for the sake
of a more extensive view, soon discerned the object
of alarm, when, turning towards his companions,
he shouted,
“Wounds,—but here's a sight! Pike and musket,
belt and saddle, boys! To it quickly;—you shall
have rare work anon. Wake up the ban dogs of the
fort and get into your harness. Here comes the
Dutch Doctor with his trumpeter as fierce as the
Dragon of Wantley. Buckle to and stand your
ground!”
“Ho, ho!” roared the fiddler with an impudent,
swaggering laugh. “Here's a pretty upshot to your
valours! Much cry and little wool, like the Devil's
I have told you it was the Dutch Doctor,—if your
fright had left you but a handful of sense to ask a
question? Didn't I see both him and his trumpeter
last night at the Crow and Archer, with all their jingumbobs
in a pair of panniers? Oh, but he is a rare
Doctor, and makes such cures, I warrant you, as
have never been seen, known or heard of since the
days of St. Byno, who built up his own serving man
again, sound as a pipkin, after the wild beasts had
him for supper.”
The trumpet now sent forth a blast which terminated
in a long flourish, indicating the approach of
the party to the verge within which it might not be
allowable to continue such a clamour; and in a few
moments afterwards the Doctor with his attendant
entered the stable yard. He was a little, sharp-featured,
portly man, of a brown, dry complexion, in
white periwig, cream-coloured coat, and scarlet
small clothes: of a brisk gait, and consequential air,
which was heightened by the pompous gesture with
which he swayed a gold-mounted cane full as tall as
himself. His attendant, a bluff, burly, red-eyed man,
with a singularly stolid countenance, tricked out in a
grotesque costume, of which a short cloak, steeple-crowned
hat and feather, and enormous nether garments,
all of striking colours, were the most notable
components, bore a brass trumpet suspended on one
side, and a box of no inconsiderable dimensions in
front of his person; and thus furnished, followed close
had been so authentically announced.
No sooner had the Doctor got fairly within the gate
than he was met by Derrick Brown, who, being the
most authoritative personage in the yard, took upon
himself the office of giving the stranger welcome.
“Frents, how do you do?” was the Doctor's accost
in a strong, Low Dutch method of pronouncing English.
“I pelieve dis is not de gate I should have entered
to see his Lordship de Lord Proprietary,” he
added, looking about him with some surprise to find
where he was.
“If it was my Lord you came to see,” said the
falconer, “you should have turned to your right, and
gone by the road which leads to the front of the
house. But the way you have come is no whit the
longer: we can take you through, Master Doctor,
by the back door.”
“Vell, vell, dere is noding lost by peing acquainted
at once wid de people of de house,” replied the man
of medicine; “dere is luck to make your first entrance
by de pack door, as de old saying is. I vas
summoned dis morning to appear before de council,
py my Lord's order; and so, I thought I might trive
a little pusiness, at de same time, wid de family.”
“I told you all,” said Willy, with an air of self-importance
at his own penetration, “that this was a
rare doctor. The council hath sent for him! my
Lord hath made it a state matter to see him. It
is n't every doctor that comes before the worshipful
beavers.”
At this command several of the domestics touched
their hats, with a gesture partly in earnest and partly
in sport, as if expecting some diversion to follow.
“No capping to me, my frents!” exclaimed the
Doctor, with a bow, greatly pleased at these tokens
of respect; “no capping to me! Pusiness is pusiness,
and ven I come to sell you tings dat shall do
you goot, I tank you for your custom and your
money, widout asking you to touch your cap.”
“There is sense in that,” said John Alward; “and
since you come to trade in the yard, Doctor, you can
show us your wares. There is a penny to be picked
up here.”
“Open your box, Doctor; bring out your penny-worths;
show us the inside!” demanded several
voices at once.
“Ha, ha!” exclaimed the vender of drugs, “you
are wise, goot frents; you know somewhat! You
would have a peep at my aurum potabiles in dat little
casket—my multum in parvo? Yes, you shall see,
and you shall hear what you have never seen pefore,
and shall not in your long lives again.”
“Have you e'er a good cleansing purge for a
moulting hawk?” inquired Derrick Brown, whilst the
doctor was unlocking the box.
“Or a nostrum that shall be sure work on a horse
with a farcy?” asked one of the grooms.
“Hast thou an elixir that shall expel a lumbago?”
same instant.
“Tib, the cook,” said a fourth, “has been so sore
beset with cramps, that only this morning she was
saying, in her heart she believed she would not stop
to give the paste buckle that Tom Oxcart gave her
for a token at Whitsuntide, for a cordial that would
touch a cold stomach. I will persuade her into a
trade with the Doctor.”
“Oh, as for the women,” replied a fifth, “there
is n't a wench in my Lord's service that has n't a
bad tooth, or a cold stomach, or a tingling in the
ears, or some such ailing: it is their nature—they
would swallow the Doctor's pack in a week, if they
had license.”
The man of nostrums was too much employed in
opening out his commodities to heed the volley of
questions which were poured upon him all round, but
having now put himself in position for action, he addressed
himself to his auditors:
“I vill answer all your questions in goot time; but
I must crave your leave, frents, to pegin in de order
of my pusiness. Dobel,” he said, turning to his attendant,
who stood some paces in the rear, “come
forward and pegin.”
The adjutant at this command stepped into the
middle of the ring, and after making several strange
grimaces, of which at first view his countenance
would have been deemed altogether incapable, and
bowing in three distinct quarters to the company,
commenced the following speech:
“Goot beoplish!”—this was accompanied with a
comic leer that set the whole yard in a roar—“dish
ish de drice renowned und ingomprbl Doctor Closh
Tebor”—another grimace, and another volley of
laughter—“what ish de grand pheseeshan of de
greate gofernor of New York, Antony Prockolls,
und lives in Alpany in de gofernor's own pallash,
wid doo tousand guilders allowed him py de gofernor
everich yeere, und a goach to rite, und a podycart
to go perfore him in de sthreets ven he valks to
take de air. All tish to keepe de gofernor und his
vrouw de Laty Katerina Prockholls in goot healf—
noding else—on mein onor.” This was said with
great emphasis, the speaker laying his hand on his
heart and making a bow, accompanied with a still
more ludicrous grimace than any he had yet exhibited,
which brought forth a still louder peal from
his auditory.
He was about to proceed with his commendatory
harangue, when he was interrupted by Benedict
Leonard. It seems that upon the first announcement
by the Doctor of the purport of his visit, the youth,
fearful lest his mother, who was constitutionally subject
to alarm, might have been disturbed by the trumpet,
ran off to apprise her of what he had just witnessed;
and giving her the full advantage of Willy's
exaggerated estimate of the travelling healer of disease,
returned, by the lady's command, to conduct
this worthy into her presence. He accordingly now
delivered his message, and forthwith master and man
the stable yard at their heels.
The itinerant was introduced into Lady Baltimore's
presence in a small parlour, where she was attended
by two little girls, her only children beside the boy
we have noticed, and the sister of the Proprietary.
Her pale and emaciated frame and care-worn visage
disclosed to the practised glance of the visiter a facile
subject for his delusive art,—a ready votary of that
credulous experimentalism which has filled the world
with victims to medical imposture. In the professor
of medicine's reverence to the persons before him
there was an overstrained obsequiousness, but, at the
same time, an expression of imperturbable confidence
fully according with the ostentatious pretension which
marked his demeanour amongst the menials of the
household. Notwithstanding his broad accent, he
spoke with a ready fluency that showed him well
skilled in that voluble art by which, at that day, the
workers of wonderful cures and the possessors of infallible
elixirs advertised the astonishing virtues of
their compounds—an art which has in our time only
changed its manner of utterance, and now announces
its ridiculous pretensions in every newspaper of every
part of our land, in whole columns of mountebank
lies and quack puffery.
“This is the great Doctor,” said Benedict Leonard,
who now acted as gentleman usher, “and he has
come I can't tell how far, to see who was ailing in
our parts. I just whispered to him, dear mother,
what a famous good friend you were to all sorts of
what a box of crankums he has in the hall! Yes,
and a man to carry it, with a trumpet! Blowing and
physicking a plenty now, to them that like it! How
the man bears such a load, I can't guess.”
“Dobel has a strong back and a steady mule for
his occasions, my pretty poy,” said the Doctor, patting
the heir apparent on the head, with a fondness
of manner that sensibly flattered the mother. “When
we would do goot, master, we must not heed de trouble
to seek dem dat stand in need of our ministrations
over de world.”
The lady's feeble countenance lit up with a sickly
smile as she remonstrated with the boy. “Bridle thy
tongue, Benedict, nor suffer it to run so nimbly. We
have heard, Doctor, something of your fame, and
gladly give you welcome.”
“Noble lady,” replied the pharmacopolist, “I am
but a simple and poor Doctor, wid such little fame as
it has pleased Got to pestow for mine enteavours to
miticate de distemperatures and maladies and infirmities
which de fall of man, in de days of Adam, de
august progenitor of de human races, has prought
upon all his children. And de great happiness I have
had to make many most wonderful cures in de provinces
of America, made me more pold to hope I
might pring some assuagement and relief to your
ladyship, who, I have peen told, has peen grievously
tormented wid perturbations and melancholies; a
very common affection wid honourable ladies.”
“Alack, Doctor, my affections come from causes
lady with a sigh. “Still, it would please me to hear
the cures you speak of. You have, doubtless, had
great experience?”
“You shall hear, my lady. I am not one of dat
rabble of pretenders what travel apout de world to
cry up and magnify dere own praises. De Hemel is
mij getuige,—Heaven is my chudge, and your ladyship's
far renowned excellent wisdom forbids dat you
should be imposed upon by dese cheats and impostors
denominated—and most justly, on my wort!—charlatans
and empirical scaramouches. De veritable
merit in dis world is humble, my lady. I creep rader
in de dust, dan soar in de clouts:—it is in my nature.
Oders shall speak for me—not myself.”
“But you have seen the world, Doctor, and studied,
and served in good families?”
“Your ladyship has great penetration. I have always
lived in friendship wid worshipful peoples. De
honourable Captain General Anthony Brockholls, de
governor of de great province of New York,—hah!
dere was nopody could please him but Doctor Debor.
Night and day, my lady, for two years, have I peen
physicking his excellency and all his family:—de
governor is subject to de malady of a pad digestion
and crudities which gives him troublesome dreams.
I have studied in de school of Leyden—dree courses,
until I could find no more to learn; and den I have
travelled in France, Germany, and Italy, where I
took a seat in de great University of Padua, for de
penefit of de lectures of dat very famous doctor,
and professor of botany, a most rare herbalist.
And dere also I much increased and enriched my
learning under de wing of dat astonishing man, de
grave and profound Doctor Athelsteinus Leonenas,
de expounder of de great secrets of de veins and
nerves. You shall chudge, honourable ladies, what
was my merit, when I tell you de University would
make me Syndicus Artistarum, only dat I refused so
great honour, pecause I would not make de envy of
my compeers. Did I not say true when I tell you it
is not my nature to soar in de clouts?”
“Truly the Doctor hath greatly slighted his fame,”
said the Lady Maria apart to her kinswoman. “I
would fain know what you have in your pack.”
“Worshipful madam, you shall soon see,” replied
the Doctor, who now ordered Dobel, his man, into
the room. “Here,” he said, as he pointed to the different
parcels, “are balsamums, panaceas, and elixirs.
Dis is a most noted alexipharmacum against quartan
agues, composed of many roots, herps and spices;
dis I call de lampas vitæ, an astonishing exhilirator
and promoter of de goot humours of de mind, and
most valuable for de rare gift of clear sight to de old,
wid many oder virtues I will not stop to mention.
Dese are confections, electuaries, sirups, conserves,
ointments, odoraments, cerates, and gargarisms, for
de skin, for de stomach, for de pruises and wounds,
for de troat, and every ting pesides. Ah! here, my
lady, is de great lapour of my life, de felicity and
royal reward—as I may say—of all my studies: it is
Medicamentum Promethei, which has done
more penefactions dan all de oder simples and compounds
in de whole pharmacopeia of medicine. Your
ladyship shall take but one half of dis little phial, when
you will say more for its praise dan I could speak
widout peing accounted a most windy, hyperbolical
and monstrous poaster—ha, waarachtig! I will speak
noting. Dat wise and sagacious and sapient man,
de great governor and captain, Antony Brockholls,
has given me in my hand so much as five ducatoons,
—yes, my lady, five ducatoons for dat little glass,
two hours after a dinner of cold endives—Ik spreek
a waarachtiglik—I speak you truly, my lady: and
now I give it away for de goot of de world and mine
own glory, at no more dan one rix dollar,—five shillings.
I do not soar in de clouts?”
“Can you describe its virtues, Doctor?” inquired
the lady.
“Mine honoured madam, dey are apundant, and I
shall not lie if I say countless and widout number.
First, it is a great enemy to plack choler, and to all
de affections of de spleen, giving sweet sleep to de
eyelids dat have peen kept open py de cares and sufferings
and anxieties of de world. It will dispel de
charms of witchcraft, magic and sorcery, and turn
away de stroke of de evil eye. It corroborates de
stomach py driving off de sour humours of de pylorus,
and cleansing de diaphram from de oppilations
which fill up and torpefy de pipes of de nerves. And
your ladyship shall observe dat, as nature has supplied
of de several parts of de animal pody, as,—not
to be tedious,—aniseeds and calamint for de head,
hysop and liquorice for de lungs, borage for de heart,
betony for de spleen, and so on wid de whole pody
—dis wonderful medicament contains and possesses
in itself someting of all, being de great remedy, antidote
and expeller of all diseases, such as vertigine, falling
sickness, cramps, catalepsies, lumbagos, rheums,
inspissations, agitations, hypocondrics, and tremorcordies,
whedder dey come of de head, de heart, de
liver, de vena cava, de mesentery or de pericardium,
making no difference if dey be hot or cold, dry or
moist, or proceeding from terrestrial or genethliacal
influences, evil genitures, or vicious aspects of de
stars—it is no matter—dey all vanish pefore de great
medicamentum. You must know, my lady, dis precious
mixture was de great secret—de arcanum mirificabile—of
dat wonderful Arabian physician Hamech,
which Paracelsus went mad wid cudgelling
his prains to find out; and Avicenna and Galen and
Trismegistus and Moderatus Columella all proke
down in deir search to discover de meaning of de
learned worts in which Hamech wrote de signification.
De great Swammerdam, hoch! what would he
not give Doctor Debor for dat secret! I got it, my
lady, from a learned Egyptian doctor, who took it
from an eremite of Arabia Felix. It was not my
merit, so much as my goot fortune. I am humble,
my lady, and do not poast, but speak op 't woord van
een eerlyk man.”
“He discourses beyond our depth,” said Lady Baltimore,
greatly puzzled to keep pace with the learned
pretensions of the quack; “and yet I dare say there
is virtue in these medicines. What call you your great
compound, Doctor? I have forgotten its name.”
“De Medicamentum Promethei,” replied the owner
of this wonderful treasure, pleased with the interest
taken in his discourse. “Your ladyship will comprehend
from your reading learned pooks, dat Prometheus
was a great headen god, what stole de fire
from Heaven, whereby he was able to vivicate and
reluminate de decayed and worn-out podies of de
human families, and in a manner even to give life to
de images of clay; which is all, as your good ladyship
discerns, a fabulous narration, or pregnant fable,
as de scholars insinuate. And moreover, de poets
and philosophers say dat same headen god was very
learned in de knowledge of de virtues of plants and
herps, which your ladyship will remark is de very
consistence and identification of de noble art of pharmacy.
Well den, dis Prometheus, my lady—ha, ha!
—was some little bit of a juggler, and was very fond
of playing his legerdemains wid de gods, till one day
de great Jupiter, peing angry wid his jocularities and
his tricks, caused him to be chained to a rock, wid a
hungry vulture always gnawing his liver; and dere
he was in dis great misery, till his pody pined away
so small dat his chain would not hold him, and den,
aha! he showed Jupiter a goot pair of heels, like an
honest fellow, and set apout to find de medicines
what should renovate and patch up his liver, which
while. Dis again is anoder fable, to signify dat he
was troubled wid a great sickness in dat part of his
pody. Now, my lady, see how well de name significates
de great virtues of my medicament, which, in
de first place, is a miraculous restorer of health and
vigour and life to de feeble spirits of de pody: dere's
de fire. Second, it is composed of more dan one
hundred plants, roots, and seeds, most delicately distilled,
sublimed and suffumigated in a limbeck of pure
virgin silver, and according to de most subtle projections
of alchemy: and dere your ladyship shall
see de knowledge of de virtues of plants and de
most consummate art of de concoctions. And now
for de last significance of de fable: dis medicament
is a specific of de highest exaltation for de cure,
which never fails, of all distemperatures of de liver;
not to say dat it is less potent to overcome and destroy
all de oder diseases I have mentioned, and many
more. Dere you see de whole Medicamentum Promethei,
which I sell to worshipful peoples for one rix
dollar de phial. Is it not well named, my lady, and
superlative cheap? I give it away: de projection
alone costs me more dan I ask for de compound.”
“The name is curiously made out,” said the lady,
“and worthily, if the virtue of the compound answer
the description. But your cures, you have not yet
touched upon them. I long to hear what notable
feats you have accomplished in that sort.”
“My man Dobel shall speak,” replied the professor.
“De great Heaven forpid I should pe a poaster
de great penefaction of de medicament upon
de excellent and discreet and virtuous vrouw of Governor
Brockholls—Spreek op eene verstaanbare
wijze!”
“Hier ben ik,” answered Dobel to this summons,
stepping at the same time into the middle of the
room and erecting his person as stiffly as a grenadier
on parade: “Goot beoplish! dish ish de drice renowned
und ingomprbl Doctor Closh Tebor—”
“Stop, stop, hou stil! halt—volslagen gek!” exclaimed
the Doctor, horrified at the nature of the
harangue his stupied servitor had commenced, and
which for a moment threatened to continue, in spite
of the violent remonstrance of the master, Dobel persevering
like a thing spoken from rather than a thing
that speaks—“Fool, jack-pudding! you pelieve yourself
on a bank, up on a stage, before de rabble rout?
You would disgrace me before honourable and noble
ladies, wid your tavern howlings, and your parkings
and your pellowings! Out of de door, pegone!”
The imperturbable and stolid trumpeter, having
thus unfortunately incurred his patron's ire, slunk
from the parlour, utterly at a loss to comprehend
wherein he had offended. The Doctor in the mean
while, overwhelmed with confusion and mortified
vanity, bustled towards the door and there continued
to vent imprecations upon the unconscious Dobel,
which, as they were uttered in Low Dutch, were altogether
incomprehensible to the company, but at the
same time were sufficiently ludicrous to produce a
a partial show of merriment in her companion.
Fortunately for the Doctor, in the midst of his embarrassment,
a messenger arrived to inform him that
his presence was required before the council, in another
part of the house, which order, although it deprived
the ladies of the present opportunity of learning
the great efficacy of the Medicamentum Promethei
in the case of the wife of Governor Brockholls,
gave the Doctor a chance of recovering his self-possession
by a retreat from the apartment. So, after
an earnest entreaty to be forgiven for the inexpert
address of his man, and a promise to resume his
discourse on a future occasion, he betook himself,
under the guidance of the messenger, to the chamber
in which the council were convened.
Here sat the Proprietary, and Philip Calvert, the
Chancellor, who were now, with five or six other
gentlemen, engaged in the transaction of business
of grave import.
Some depredations had been recently committed
upon the English by the Indians inhabiting the upper
regions of the Susquehanna,—especially by the Sinniquoes,
who, in an incursion against the Piscattaways,
a friendly tribe in the vicinity of St. Mary's,
had advanced into the low country, where they had
plundered the dwellings of the settlers and even murdered
two or three families. The victims of these
outrages happened to be Protestants, and Fendall's
party availed themselves of the circumstance, to
excite the popular jealousy against Lord Baltimore
committed by Papists in disguise.
What was therefore but an ordinary though frightful
incident of Indian hostility, was thus exaggerated
into a crime of deep malignity, peculiarly calculated
still more to embitter the party exasperations of the
day. This consideration rendered it a subject of
eager anxiety, on the part of the Council, to procure
the fullest evidence of the hostile designs of the Indians,
and thus not only to enable the province to
adopt the proper measure for its own safety, but also
confute the false report which had imputed to the
Catholics so absurd and atrocious a design. A traveller
by the name of Launcelot Sakel happened, but
two or three days before the present meeting of the
Council, to arrive at the port, where he put afloat the
story of an intended invasion of the province by certain
Indians of New York, belonging to the tribes of
the Five Nations, and gave as his authority for this
piece of news a Dutch doctor, whom he had fallen
in with on the Delaware, where he left him selling
nostrums, and who, he affirmed, was in a short space
to appear at St. Mary's. This story, with many particulars,
was communicated to the Proprietary, which
induced the order to summon the Doctor to attend the
council as soon after his arrival as possible. In obedience
to this summons, our worthy was now in the
presence of the high powers of the province, not a
little elated with the personal consequence attached
to his coming, as well as the very favourable reception
he had obtained from the ladies of the household.
inquisitive domestics, who followed, at a respectful
distance, his movement towards the council chamber,
and who, even there, though not venturing to enter,
were gathered into a group which from the outside
of the door commanded a view of the party within:
in the midst of these Willy of the Flats was by no
means an unconspicuous personage.
Lord Baltimore received the itinerant physician
with that bland and benignant accost which was habitual
to him, and proceeded with brief ceremony to
interrogate him as to the purport of his visit. The
answers were given with a solemn self-complacency,
not unmixed with that shrewdness which was an
essential attribute to the success of the ancient quacksalver.
He described himself as Doctor Claus Debor,
a native of Holland, a man of travel, enjoying no
mean renown in New York, and, for two years past,
a resident of Albany. His chief design in his present
journey, he represented to be to disseminate the
blessings of his great medicament; whereupon he
was about to launch forth into an exuberant tone of
panegyric, and had, in fact, already produced a smile
at the council board by some high wrought phrases
expressive of his incredible labour in the quest of his
great secret, when the Proprietary checked his career
by a timely admonition.
“Ay, we do not seek to know thy merits as a
physician, nor doubt the great virtue of thy drugs,
worthy Doctor; but in regard thereto, give thee free
permission to make what profit of them you reasonably
I must entreat you, in consideration that my Lady
Baltimore has weak nerves, and cannot endure rude
noises, to refrain from blowing thy trumpet within
hearing of this mansion: besides, our people,” he
added, looking archly towards the group of domestics,
some of whom had now edged into the apartment,
“are somewhat faint-hearted at such martial
sounds.”
“By my troth!” said Willy, in a half whisper to
his companions in the entry; “my Lord hath put it
to him for want of manners!—I thought as much
would come from his tantararas. Listen, you shall
hear more anon. Whist!—the Doctor puts on a face
—and will have his say, in turn.”
“Your very goot and admirable Lordship, mistranslates
de significance of my visit,” said the Doctor,
in his ambitious phrase; “for although I most
heartily tank your Lordship's bounty for de permission
to sell my inestimable medicament, and which—
Got geve het—I do hope shall much advantage my
lady wid her weak nerfs and her ailments,—still, I
come to opey your most honourable Lordship's summons,
which I make pold to pelieve is concerned wid
state matters pefore de high and noble council.”
“Well, and bravely spoken,” said Willy; “and
with a good face!—the Doctor holds his own, masters.”
“We would hear what you can tell touching a
rumour brought to us by one Master Launcelot
Proprietary.
“There is the point of the matter,” whispered
Willy, “all in an egg shell.”
“Dere is weighty news, my Lord,” replied the
Doctor. “I have goot reason to pelieve dat de Nordern
Indians of New York are meditating and concocting
mischief against your Lordship's province.”
“Have a care to the truth of your report,” said
Colonel Talbot, rising from his seat: “it may be
worse for you if you be found to trifle with us by
passing current a counterfeit story, churned into
consistence in your own brain, out of the froth of
idle, way-side gossipings. We have a statute
against the spreaders of false news.”
“Heigh, heigh!—listen to that,” said Willy, nudging
one of the crowd over whose shoulders he was
peering into the room. “There's an outcome with
a witness!—there's a flanconade that shall make the
Doctor flutter!”
“If I am mendacious,” replied the Doctor, “dat
is, if I am forgetful of mine respect for trute, dese
honourable gentlemens shall teal wid me as a lying
pusy pody and pragmatical tale-bearer. Your Lordship
shall hear. It is put a fortnight ago, when I
was making ready for dis journey, in Alpany, I
chanced to see in de town so many as two score,
perhaps fifty Indians, who were dere trading skins
for powder and shot. Dey reported demselves to be
Sinniquoes, and said dey came to talk wid de tribes
“Indeed!—there is probability in that report,”
said the Proprietary: “well, and how had they sped?
what was their success?”
“Some of de Five Nations,—I forget de name of
de tribe, my Lord—it might pe de Oneidas—dey told
us, promised to march early de next season;—in
dere own worts, when de sap pegin to rise.”
“In what force, did they say?”
“In large force, my Lord. De Piscattaways, dey
said, were frents to my Lord and de English,—and
so dey should make clean work wid red and white.”
“What more?”
“Dey signified dat dey should have great help from
de Delawares and Susquehannocks, who, as I could
make it out, wanted to go to war wid your Lordship's
peoples at once.”
“True; and they have done so. The insolencies
of these tribes are already as much as we can endure.
Did they find it easy to purchase their powder and
lead in Albany? I should hope that traffic would not
be allowed.”
“My Lord, de traders do not much stop, when
dey would turn a penny, to reckon who shall get de
loss, so dey get de profit. Dese same Indians I saw
afterwards in de town of New York, trading in de
same way wid Master Grimes, a merchant.”
“Mischief will come of this,” said the Proprietary,
“unless it be speedily taken in hand. What
in this scheme?”
“I tink it was said,” replied the Doctor, “dat
your Lordship had not made your treaties wid dem,
nor sent dem presents, dese two years past.”
“True,” interposed the Chancellor; “we have
failed in that caution—although I have more than
once reminded your Lordship of its necessity.”
“It shall not be longer delayed,” replied the Proprietary.
“You are sure, Doctor Debor, these were
Sinniquoes you saw?”
“I only know dem by dere own report—I never
heard de name pefore. My man Dobel heard dem
as well as me; wid your Lordship's permission I
shall ask him,” said the Doctor, as he went to the
door and directed some of the domestics to call the
man Dobel.
It happened that Dobel, after his disgrace, had
kept apart from the servants of the household, and
was now lamenting his misfortune in a voluntary
exile on the green at the front door, where Willy of
the Flats having hastened to seek him, gave him the
order to appear before the council.
“Dobel, you are a made man,” he said by way
of encouragement; “your master wants you to
speak to their honours: and the honourable council
want to hear you, Dobel; and so does his Lordship.
Hold up thy head, Dobel, and speak for thy manhood—boldly
and out, like a buckler man.”
“Ya, ya,” replied Dobel, whose acquirements in
the English tongue were limited to his professional
slender fragments of phrases in common use. Thus
admonished by Willy, he proceeded doggedly to the
Council Chamber, where as soon as he entered, the
Proprietary made a motion to him with his hand to
approach the table,—which Dobel interpreting into
an order to deliver his sentiments, he forthwith began
in a loud voice—
“Goot beoplish! dish is de drice renowned und
ingomprbl Doctor—”
Before he had uttered the name, the Doctor's hand
was thrust across Dobel's mouth and a volley of
Dutch oaths rapped into his ears, at a rate which utterly
confounded the poor trumpeter, who was forcibly
expelled from the room, almost by a general
order. When quiet was restored,—for it may be
imagined the scene was not barren of laughter,—the
Doctor made a thousand apologies for the stupidity
of his servant, and in due time received permission
to retire, having delivered all that he was able to
say touching the matter in agitation before the Proprietary.
The Council were for some time after this incident
engaged in the consideration of the conspiracy
against the Proprietary, of which new evidences
were every day coming to light; and it was now resolved
that the matter should be brought into the
notice of the judicial authority at an early day.
The only circumstance which I have further occasion
to notice, related to a diversion which was not
unusual at that day amongst the inhabitants of the
Council. It was brought into debate by Colonel
Talbot.
“Stark Whittle, the swordsman,” he said, “has
challenged Sergeant Travers to play a prize at such
weapons as they may select—and the Sergeant accepts
the challenge, provided it meet the pleasure of
his Lordship and the Council. I promised to be a
patron to the play.”
“It shall be as you choose,” said the Proprietary.
“This martial sport has won favour with our people.
Let it be so ordered that it tend not to the breach of
the peace. We commit it to your hands, Colonel
Talbot.” The Council, assented and the necessary
order was recorded on the journal.
| CHAPTER XVI. Rob of the Bowl | |