Very early in his life there was, alas! the least touch of the valetudinary about the “deare Squire.” It was not all fair mornings and larks and roses. One section of his little book of essays is devoted to “the accidents of an ague,” and deals with the invasion, the hot and cold fits, the letting of blood, the taking of physick, the syrups and other sweet things sent by the doctor, the want of sleep, the telling of the strokes of an ill-going clock in the night, the thief in the candle, the danger of death, the fear of relapse; and at the end, when Robyn is his own man again—the “reviewing and tacking together the several bills filed up in the Apothecary’s Shop.” In the summer of 1647, Robert Boyle had been ill; but in the autumn he paid some visits among his relations, and early in 1648 he went to Holland, “partly to visit the country,” and partly to help his brother Frank conduct his brilliant wife home from The Hague—a mission that must have required all Frank’s sweetness of spirit and all Robyn’s philosophy. In the summer of 1648, Robert Boyle was again in London;—this time, Lady Ranelagh had taken rooms for him in St. James’s. CHAPTER X A KIND OF ELYSIUM “This blessed plot, this Earth, this Realme, this England, This Nurse, this teeming wombe of Royall Kings, Fear’d by their breed and famous for their birth, Renowned for their deeds, as farre from home, For Christian seruice, and true Chiualrie, As is the sepulcher in stubborne Iury Of the World’s ransome, blessed _Marie’s_ Sonne. This Land of such deere soules, this deere-deere Land, Deere for her reputation through the world....” Shakespeare’s _Richard the Second_ (First Folio, 1623).