Then Mrs Fludger dashed cold water in the patient's face, slapped her hands with a vigour that would have brought tears to her eyes had she been conscious, and made a horrible smell with the benzoline lamp and a pigeon's feather hastily begged from a lodger who had leanings ornithological. Alice showing no signs of being affected by the application of these generally efficacious remedies, Mrs Fludger decided that this was a case of 'going off' quite beyond her experience, and feeling the responsibility too much to be borne alone, she despatched her third son in quest of a doctor, regardless of Miss Jenny's opinion that the lodger was 'shamming.' Joe Fludger was not particularly pleased at being sent. He was busy just then shaking up a mangy kitten and a recently-acquired guinea-pig in a box, with a view of getting them to fight, which they showed no signs of doing, and he did not care to relinquish this enthralling pastime until he had compassed his end. He put his two 'pets' into one pocket, hoping that that position would urge them to fulfil their destiny and have it out, and as he met several friends, and felt it incumbent on him to exhibit his treasures to each of them, it was some time before he carried out his instructions, and brought medical science, as represented by Dr Moore, to 15 Spray's Buildings. But even when the doctor did at last stand by her bedside, Alice was still insensible. He raised her eyelids, felt her pulse, asked one or two brief questions, and then stood holding her hand till she sighed, and moved slightly. 'She's coming round,' he said. 'Not married, I see,' he added, glancing at the hand he held, on which shone no golden circle, not even the brass substitute which takes its place occasionally, when times are very hard. 'Not as I ever heard of,' said Miss Jenny with a toss of the net, which drew down upon her a glance of disapproval from the old doctor, and a sharp recommendation from her mother to go downstairs. 'Give the girl air; there's too many of us here a'ready.' Miss Fludger withdrew with a gesture expressive of a sovereign contempt for faints in general, and this collapse in particular. 'How does this poor thing get her living?' asked the doctor; 'she looks as if she got it honestly.' He, being an observant man, glanced as he spoke at the roughened forefinger of her left hand, and then round the bare, dreary attic. 'Lord! doctor, how should I know? Do you think I puts all my lodgers through their cataclysm before I takes 'em in?' said Mrs Fludger, with some general recollection of the days when she went to Sunday school. Mrs Fludger did not always manage to hit on the right word to express the meaning she intended to convey, but she always found a word something like the right one, and a word which really had a place in the English dictionary; she had a rare dexterity in the finding of such words, and a fine confidence in the use of them, which made them answer her purpose admirably.