by way of Millbank and Parliament Street, when he stopped to think
of Canning, and look at the Houses of Parliament. Now, you know
far more of the philosophy of Mind than our bore does, and are much
better able to explain to him than he is to explain to you why or
wherefore, at that particular time, the thought of fire should come
into his head. But, it did. It did. He thought, What a national
calamity if an edifice connected with so many associations should
be consumed by fire! At that time there was not a single soul in
the street but himself. All was quiet, dark, and solitary. After
contemplating the building for a minute – or, say a minute and a
half, not more – our bore proceeded on his way, mechanically
repeating, What a national calamity if such an edifice, connected
with such associations, should be destroyed by – A man coming
towards him in a violent state of agitation completed the sentence,
with the exclamation, Fire! Our bore looked round, and the whole
structure was in a blaze.
In harmony and union with these experiences, our bore never went
anywhere in a steamboat but he made either the best or the worst
voyage ever known on that station. Either he overheard the captain
say to himself, with his hands clasped, ‘We are all lost!’ or the
captain openly declared to him that he had never made such a run
before, and never should be able to do it again. Our bore was in
that express train on that railway, when they made (unknown to the
passengers) the experiment of going at the rate of a hundred to
miles an hour. Our bore remarked on that occasion to the other
people in the carriage, ‘This is too fast, but sit still!’ He was
at the Norwich musical festival when the extraordinary echo for
which science has been wholly unable to account, was heard for the
first and last time. He and the bishop heard it at the same
moment, and caught each other’s eye. He was present at that
illumination of St. Peter’s, of which the Pope is known to have
remarked, as he looked at it out of his window in the Vatican, ‘O
CIELO! QUESTA COSA NON SARA FATTA, MAI ANCORA, COME QUESTA – O
Heaven! this thing will never be done again, like this!’ He has
seen every lion he ever saw, under some remarkably propitious
circumstances. He knows there is no fancy in it, because in every
case the showman mentioned the fact at the time, and congratulated
him upon it.
At one period of his life, our bore had an illness. It was an
illness of a dangerous character for society at large. Innocently
remark that you are very well, or that somebody else is very well;
and our bore, with a preface that one never knows what a blessing
health is until one has lost it, is reminded of that illness, and
drags you through the whole of its symptoms, progress, and
treatment. Innocently remark that you are not well, or that
somebody else is not well, and the same inevitable result ensues.
You will learn how our bore felt a tightness about here, sir, for
which he couldn’t account, accompanied with a constant sensation as
if he were being stabbed – or, rather, jobbed – that expresses it
more correctly – jobbed – with a blunt knife. Well, sir! This
went on, until sparks began to flit before his eyes, water-wheels
to turn round in his head, and hammers to beat incessantly, thump,
thump, thump, all down his back – along the whole of the spinal
vertebrae. Our bore, when his sensations had come to this, thought
it a duty he owed to himself to take advice, and he said, Now, whom
shall I consult? He naturally thought of Callow, at that time one
of the most eminent physicians in London, and he went to Callow.
Callow said, ‘Liver!’ and prescribed rhubarb and calomel, low diet,
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Dickens, Charles – Reprinted Pieces
and moderate exercise. Our bore went on with this treatment,
getting worse every day, until he lost confidence in Callow, and