One dark, stormy night in the summer of ---- finding my system had lost much of its _humidum radicale_, or radical moisture, in truth a very alarming premonitory, I directed Mrs. Tonic in preparing my warm _aqua fontana_ to infuse a _quantum sufficit_ of Hollands; of which having taken a somewhat copious draught, I sought my cubiculum. Let no one imagine however, that I give the least countenance to the free use of alcoholic mixtures. They are undoubtedly poisonous, and like other poisons, which hold a high rank in our pharmacopeia, it is only when taken under the direction of those deemed cunning in our art, that they exert a healing power, and as one Shakspeare happily expresses it, "ascend me to the brain." Now as the radical moisture is essential to vitality and as this moisture is promoted in a wonderful degree by potations of Hollands, we of the Faculty hold with Horatius Flaccus "_omnes eodem cogimur_"--we may all _cogue_ it. But to return to my _narratio_ or story as it may be called. I had hardly "steep'd my senses in forgetfulness" as some one quaintly says, when I was effectually aroused by a loud knocking at the window. The blows were so heavy and frequent that Mrs. Tonic though somewhat unadorned, it being her hour for retiring, yet fearful of fractured glass, hurried to the door. I might here mention, in order to show the reason of Mrs. Tonic's fears, that my parlor front-window had been lately beautified with an enlarged sash containing not seven by nine, the size generally used, but eight by ten--panes certainly of a rare and costly size and which Mrs. Tonic had the honor of introducing. The cause of this unseasonable disturbance proved to be a messenger from Deacon Sykes stating that good Mrs. Sykes was alarmingly ill and desiring my immediate attendance. Now in the whole range of my practice there was no one whose call was sooner heeded than Mrs. Sykes's; for besides being an ailing woman and of course a profitable patient, she had much influence in our village as the wife of Deacon Sykes. But I must confess that on this occasion I did feel an unwillingness to resume my habiliments, that night as I before remarked, being uncommonly stormy and myself feeling sensibly the effects of the sudorific I had just taken. Still I should willingly have exposed myself had not Mrs. Tonic gathered from the messenger that it was only a return of Mrs. Sykes's old complaint, that excruciating pain, the colic; for Mrs. Sykes was flatulent. As the medicine I had hitherto prescribed for her in such aliments had been wonderfully blessed, I directed Mrs. Tonic to bring my saddle-bags, from which having prepared a somewhat smart dose of _tinct. rhei._ with _carb. soda_, I gave it to the messenger bidding him return with all speed. In the belief that this would prove efficacious, I again turned to woo the not reluctant Somnus, but scarcely had an hour elapsed when I was again alarmed by repeated blows first at the door and then at the window.