On visiting a nobleman, Sir Richard Jebb was paid in hand three guineas when he, by right, expected five. The doctor purposely dropped the three gold pieces on the carpet, when the nobleman directed the servant to find and restore them; but Sir Richard still continued the search after receiving the three coins. "Are they not all found?" inquired the nobleman, looking about. "No, there must be two more on the carpet, as I have only three restored," replied the wily doctor. His lordship took the hint, and said, "Never mind; here are two others." [Illustration: DEATH'S FEE.] This sticking for a fee was all cast into the shade by the act of an "eminent physician of Bristol." The doctor, entering the bedroom immediately after the death of his patient, found the right hand clinched tightly, and, pulling open the fingers of the dead man, the doctor discovered that the hand contained a guinea. "Ah!" exclaimed the doctor to the servant and friends around him, "this was doubtless intended for me;" and so saying he pocketed the coin. "Three hungry travellers found a bag of gold. One ran into the town where bread was sold. He thought, 'I will poison the bread I buy, And seize the treasure when my comrades die.' But they, too, thought, when back his feet have hied, We will destroy him, and the gold divide. They killed him, and, partaking of the bread, In a few moments all were lying dead. O world, behold what ill thy goods have done! Thy gold thus poisoned two and murdered one." [Illustration] XVII. LOVE AND LOVERS. "No task is harder than that of writing to the ideas of another."--JOHNSON. _Duke._ "If ever thou shalt love, In the sweet pangs of it, remember me; For such as I am all true lovers are; Unstaid and skittish in all things else, Save in the constant image of the creature That is beloved.... My life upon it, young as thou art, thine eye Hath stayed upon some face that it loves; Hath it not, boy?" XANTIPPE, BEFORE JEALOUSY.--A FIRST LOVE--BLASTED HOPES.--A DOCTOR'S STORY.--THE FLIGHT FROM "THE HOUNDS OF THE LAW."--THE EXILE AND RETURN.--DISGUISED AS A PEDDLER.--ESCAPES WITH HIS LOVE.--ENGLISH BEAUS.--YOUNG COQUETTES.--A GAY AND DANGEROUS BEAU.--HANDSOME BEAUS.--LEAP YEAR.--AN OLD BEAU.--BEAUTY NOT ALL-POTENT.--OFFENDED ROYALTY.--YOUTH AND AGE.--A STABLE BOY.--POET-DOCTOR. An old lady once said, "I've hearn say that doctors either are, or are not, great experts in love affairs; I've forgotten which." Just so! "I would not be a doctor's wife for the world," I have heard many a lady affirm. True; for few doctors have had the misfortune (or folly) to select a jealous woman for a life companion.