The Caxtons: A Family Picture — Volume 06. Эдвард Бульвер-Литтон

of him but to stand still. You see he moved even for Saint Amable. My dear madam, you and I understand each other; and it is a very hard thing to grow old, do what one will to keep young."

      "What say you, Roland, of these two malcontents?" asked my father. The Captain turned uneasily in his chair, for the rheumatism was gnawing his shoulder, and sharp pains were shooting through his mutilated limb.

      "I say," answered Roland, "that these men are wearied with marching from Brentford to Windsor,—that they have never known the bivouac and the battle."

      Both the grumblers turned their eyes to the veteran: the eyes rested first on the furrowed, care-worn lines in his eagle face; then they fell on the stiff outstretched cork limb; and then they turned away.

      Meanwhile my mother had softly risen, and under pretence of looking for her work on the table near him, bent over the old soldier and pressed his hand.

      "Gentlemen," said my father, "I don't think my brother ever heard of Nichocorus, the Greek comic writer; yet he has illustrated him very ably. Saith Nichocorus, 'The best cure for drunkenness is a sudden calamity.' For chronic drunkenness, a continued course of real misfortune must be very salutary!"

      No answer came from the two complainants; and my father took up a great book.

      CHAPTER II

      "Mr friends," said my father, looking up from his book, and addressing himself to his two visitors, know of one thing, milder than calamity, that would do you both a great deal of good."

      "What is that?" asked Sir Sedley.

      "A saffron bag, worn at the pit of the stomach!"

      "Austin, my dear," said my mother, reprovingly.

      My father did not heed the interruption, but continued gravely: "Nothing is better for the spirits! Roland is in no want of saffron, because he is a warrior; and the desire of fighting and the hope of victory infuse such a heat into the spirits as is profitable for long life, and keeps up the system."

      "Tut!" said Trevanion.

      "But gentlemen in your predicament must have recourse to artificial means. Nitre in broth, for instance,—about three grains to ten (cattle fed upon nitre grow fat); or earthy odors,—such as exist in cucumbers and cabbage. A certain great lord had a clod of fresh earth, laid in a napkin, put under his nose every morning after sleep. Light anointing of the head with oil, mixed with roses and salt, is not bade but, upon the whole, I prescribe the saffron bag at the—"