Geoffery Gambado : $b or, A simple remedy for hypochondriacism and melancholy splenetic humoursCobbold, Richard
General
Geoffery Gambado : $b or, A simple remedy for hypochondriacism and melancholy splenetic humours
Cobbold, Richard
Horsemanship -- England -- Fiction; Humorous stories
A friend in need is a friend indeed;
If you find him, own his worth;
He has never a word, but 'tis always God speed,
From the east to west, from south to north;
Do good to all, and do evil to none,
And do to others,--what should be done.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER XIII.
_A Daisy Cutter, with his Varieties._
In the month of July, 1780, Doctor Geoffery Gambado was visited, from
Birmingham, by the celebrated cutler, Mr. John Green, a gentleman who
had become uncommonly dyspeptic from a great excrescence, wart, or wen,
that grew out of his right temple, almost covering his ear. It gave him
no particular pain, except when he chanced to recline upon that part of
his head; yet, as every body looked at it, who came into his shop, and
when he appeared at church, or in any public place, he grew uncommonly
irritable and nervous. The faculty pronounced it too large to be cut
out; and, if the truth be told, Mr. Green himself had such a horror of
cutting, that, though a dealer in cutlery and in the very first steel
articles, he had an unconquerable distaste to the knife being used upon
his own person.
Like many other good kind of men, he dealt in articles that others
might use; but he himself had no wish to use them. Those who use the
sinews of men, that is, of other men, for their own speculative
purposes, and actually abhor the use of the very things they sell,
should be careful of the exciting, inciting, or foolish words they
utter, lest their language should superinduce others to use those
articles in which their traffic is, to their own destruction. Mr.
Burton, the great Quaker, was a dealer in Burton ale to a great extent,
though he was himself a rigidly abstemious man; yet, as his trade was a
good one, and paid well both in the north and south, he could afford to
give considerable sums to temperance, or even total abstinence
societies, without feeling any loss in his trade. The fact is, until the
bright men of traffic shall find out that the ruling principle of their
souls is coveteousness, they will never reform the world by a spurious
profusion of words and calculations, which have only that one principle
to appeal to as their own support.
Mr. Green dealt in swords, and knives and forks, in guns and pistols, in
lancets and razors; but he would not suffer the lancet or the knife to
touch his own flesh. He was a dealer in weapons, not in blows. A man of
peace, yet, like many a man styling himself a friend to humanity, and
assuming apostolic liberty, he could find fault with every thing and
every body; yet, for trade's sake, he had no objection to the demand
for swords, guns, or pistols. He could supply the government with any
quantity from his stores in Birmingham.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account