MEDICO

How now neighbour Wild-man? What ecstasy is this? Why neighbour Wild-man, disclose your griefs to me, I am a Surgeon, and perchance may cure um? Why what's the matter, neighbour? Oh I hear he has seduced away your Parishioners, is this the cause of your Lamentation? Never fear it, I have one was sent from a— faith I cannot think on's name, a great Emperor, he that I did the great cure on, you have herd on't I am sure: I fetched ched his head from China, after it had been there a fort night buried, and set it on his shoulders again, and made him as lively, as ever I saw him in my life; and yet to see I should not think on's name. Oh I have it now, Prester John, a pox on't, Prester John, 'twas he, he, I faith, 'twas Prester John; I might have had his Daughter if I had not been a fool; and have lived Like a Prince all the days of my life; nay, and perchance have inherited the Crown after his death; but a pox on't, her lips were too thick for me, and that I should not think on Prester John. Why call him out Sir. Salve M r . Simplicius. I pray Sir bring him out in his Chair, and if the house can furnish you with Barbers provision, let all be in readiness. Him? why neighbour, do you not remember the Thumb? Why the Thumb, the Thumb, do you not know the cure of the Thumb? Remember't? I, and perfectly, I have it at my fin gers end, and thus it is. Two Gentlemen were fighting, one lost his Thumb, I bychance coming by, took it up, put it in my pocket, some two months after, meeting the Gentle man, I set on his Thumb again; and if he were now in Cam bridge, I could have his hand to show for't: why did you never hear of the Thumb Sir? it's strange you never herd me speak of the Thumb Sir. Yet I have had many, and royal ones too; I have done Cures beyond Seas, that will not be believed in Eng land. The great Turk can witness, I am sure, the eyes that he wears, are of my making. Why, won't you believe it? why I tell you I am able to say't, I saw't, I saw't my self, I cured the King of Po land of a Wart on's nose, and Bethlehem Gaber of a Ring worm. Pox of your old With es medicines; the worst of mine Ingredients is and Unicorns Horn, and a Bezars stone: Raw Beef and Inkhorns! Why, I cured Sherley in the Grand Sophies Court in Persia, when he had been twice shot through with Ordinance, and had two bullets in each thigh, and so quickly, that he was able at night to lie with his wife the Sophies niece, and beget a whole Church of Christians; and could this have been done with Raw Beef and Ink horns? The King of Russia had died of the worms, but for a powder I sent him. In the siege of Ostend, I gave the Duchess of Austria a receipt to keep her Smock from being animated, when she had not shifted it of a twelvemonth. I am able by the virtue of one Salve, to heal all the wounds and breaches in Bohemia. I cured the state of Venice of a Dropsy, the Low-Countries of a Lethargy, and if it had not been treason, I had cured the Fistula, that it should have dropped no more then your nose. By one Dram on a knifes point, I restored Men field to his full strength and forces, when he had no men left, but was only skin and bones. I made and Arm for Bruns wick, with so great art and skill, as nature her self could not have mended it; which had it not come too late, and after his death, would have done him as much service as that which was shot off. I could make a Purgation, that should so scour the Seas, that never a Dunkirk durst show his head. I have done as great wonders as these, when I extracted as much chastity from a Sanctimony in the English Nunnery, as cured the Pope of his lechery. And there was no man in the Realm of France, either French or Spanish or Italian Doctors, but my self, that durst undertake the King of France his Corns, and after wards having cured him, I drank a health to him. And do you seem to misdoubt my skill, and speak of my Art with ifs and ands? Do you take me for a Mountebank? and hath mine own tongue been so silent in my praise, that you have not herd of my skill? Here hold the Basin, you the Napkins, and you M r Simplicius to e Boxes, how shall we do to lay his feet up on? By my troth Sir, he is wonderfully hurt, his piam ter I perceive is clean out of joint; of the 20. bones of the Cra nium there is but three only whole, the rest are miserably crushed and broken, and two of his Sutures are clean pe rished, only the Sagitall remains free from violence, the four Tunicates of his eyes are threadbare, the Meninx of his are is Like a cut Drum, and the hammers lost: there is not a Can tilago in his head worth three pence, the top of his nose is dropped away, there is not a Muscle left in the Cavities of his Nostrils, his dentes molares are passed grinding, his Pa et is lost, and with it his gurgulio, yet if he can swallow, I warrant his drinking safe: help open his mouth. So, so, his throat is found: he's well I warrant you; now give him a cup of Sack: so let me chafe his Temples, put this powder into anon there glass of Sack, and my life for his, he is as found as the best of us all: let down his legs. How do you Sir? What should I do with him? Danger? what danger can there be, when I am his Surgeon? Why, what if he had never and head? am not I able to make him one? or if it were beaten to atomes, I could set it together, as perfectly as in the womb. Why? I'll tell you Sir, what I did, a far greater wonder then any of these, I was a Traveler. And another friend of mine travailed with me, and to be short, I came into the Country of Cannibals, where missing my friend, I ran to seek him, and came at last into a Land where I saw a company feeding on him, they had eaten half of him, I was very pensive at his misfortune, or rather mine at last I bethought me of a powder that I had about me, I put it into their wine, they had no sooner drank of it, but they presently disgorged their stomachs, and fell asleep; I Sir, gathered up the miserable morsels of my friend, placed them together, and restored him to be a perfect man again; and if he were here still alive, he were able to witness it him self, and do you think I cannot cure a ten-groates dam mage, or a cracked Crown. I have gold enough Sir, and Philosophy enough, for my house is paved with Philosophers stones, mine only desire is, that you forgive the rage of this wildeman, who is heartily sorry for his offence to you.