The Recreations of a Country ParsonBoyd, Andrew Kennedy Hutchison
General
The Recreations of a Country Parson
Boyd, Andrew Kennedy Hutchison
Clergy -- Anecdotes; Country life -- England; Rural clergy -- England
made the midnight watches terrible, exchanged for the long refreshful
sleep that makes one mouthful of the night. You will find the
gloom and depression and anxiety which were growing your habitual
temper, succeeded by a lightness of heart and buoyancy of spirit
which you cannot account for, but which you thankfully enjoy. We
doubt not that some of our readers, filled with terrible ideas as
to the violent and perilous nature of the Water Cure, will give
us credit for some strength of mind when we tell them that we have
proved for ourselves the entire mode of life; we can assure them
that there is nothing so very dreadful about it; and we trust they
may not smile at us as harmlessly monomaniacal when we say that,
without going the lengths its out-and-out advocates do, we believe
that in certain states of health much benefit may really be
derived from the system, Sir E. B. Lytton's eloquent Confessions
of a Water-Patient have been before the public for some years. The
Hints to the Sick, the Lame, and the Lazy, give us an account of
the ailments and recovery of an old military officer, who, after
suffering severety from gout, was quite set up by a few weeks at a
hydropathic establishment at Marienberg on the Rhine; and who, by
occasional recurrence to the same remedy, is kept in such a state
of preservation that, though advanced in years, he 'is able to go
eight miles within two hours, and can go up hill with most young
fellows.' The old gentleman's book, with its odd woodcuts, and a
certain freshness and incorrectness of style--we speak grammatically--in
keeping with the character of an old soldier, is readable enough.
Mr. Lane's books are far from being well written; the Spirits and
Water, especially, is extremely poor stuff. The Month at Malvern
is disfigured by similar faults of style; but Mr. Lane has really
something to tell us in that work: and there is a good deal
of interest at once in knowing how a man who had been reduced to
the last degree of debility of body and mind, was so effectually
restored, that now for years he has, on occasion, proved himself
equal to a forty-miles' walk among the Welsh mountains on a warm
summer day; and also in remarking the boyish exhilaration of spirits
in which Mr. Lane writes, which he tells us is quite a characteristic
result of 'initiation into the excitements of the Water Cure.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account