Green Tea; Mr. Justice HarbottleLe Fanu, Joseph Sheridan
Science
Green Tea; Mr. Justice Harbottle
Le Fanu, Joseph Sheridan
Ghost stories
"Oh dear, yes! I owe Swedenborg a great deal; you will discover traces
of him in the little book on Metaphysical Medicine, which you were so good
as to remember."
Although my friend affected a gaiety of manner, there was a slight flush
in his face, and I could perceive that he was inwardly much perturbed.
"I'm scarcely yet qualified, I know so little of Swedenborg. I've only
had them a fortnight," he answered, "and I think they are rather likely
to make a solitary man nervous--that is, judging from the very little I
have read--I don't say that they have made me so," he laughed; "and I'm
so very much obliged for the book. I hope you got my note?"
I made all proper acknowledgments and modest disclaimers.
"I never read a book that I go with, so entirely, as that of yours," he
continued. "I saw at once there is more in it than is quite unfolded. Do
you know Dr. Harley?" he asked, rather abruptly.
In passing, the editor remarks that the physician here named was one of
the most eminent who had ever practised in England.
I did, having had letters to him, and had experienced from him great
courtesy and considerable assistance during my visit to England.
"I think that man one of the very greatest fools I ever met in my life,"
said Mr. Jennings.
This was the first time I had ever heard him say a sharp thing of
anybody, and such a term applied to so high a name a little startled me.
"Really! and in what way?" I asked.
"In his profession," he answered.
I smiled.
"I mean this," he said: "he seems to me, one half, blind--I mean one
half of all he looks at is dark--preternaturally bright and vivid all
the rest; and the worst of it is, it seems _wilful_. I can't get him--I
mean he won't--I've had some experience of him as a physician, but I
look on him as, in that sense, no better than a paralytic mind, an
intellect half dead. I'll tell you--I know I shall some time--all about
it," he said, with a little agitation. "You stay some months longer in
England. If I should be out of town during your stay for a little time,
would you allow me to trouble you with a letter?"
"I should be only too happy," I assured him.
"Very good of you. I am so utterly dissatisfied with Harley."
"A little leaning to the materialistic school," I said.
"A _mere_ materialist," he corrected me; "you can't think how that sort
of thing worries one who knows better. You won't tell any one--any of my
friends you know--that I am hippish; now, for instance, no one knows--not
even Lady Mary--that I have seen Dr. Harley, or any other doctor. So
pray don't mention it; and, if I should have any threatening of an
attack, you'll kindly let me write, or, should I be in town, have a
little talk with you."
I was full of conjecture, and unconsciously I found I had fixed my eyes
gravely on him, for he lowered his for a moment, and he said:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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