getting-up art, practised by the laundress, are to be printed off,
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all over his soft arms and legs, as I constantly observe them? The
starch enters his soul; who can wonder that he cries?
Was Augustus George intended to have limbs, or to be born a Torso?
I presume that limbs were the intention, as they are the usual
practice. Then, why are my poor child’s limbs fettered and tied
up? Am I to be told that there is any analogy between Augustus
George Meek and Jack Sheppard?
Analyse Castor Oil at any Institution of Chemistry that may be
agreed upon, and inform me what resemblance, in taste, it bears to
that natural provision which it is at once the pride and duty of
Maria Jane to administer to Augustus George! Yet, I charge Mrs.
Prodgit (aided and abetted by Mrs. Bigby) with systematically
forcing Castor Oil on my innocent son, from the first hour of his
birth. When that medicine, in its efficient action, causes
internal disturbance to Augustus George, I charge Mrs. Prodgit
(aided and abetted by Mrs. Bigby) with insanely and inconsistently
administering opium to allay the storm she has raised! What is the
meaning of this?
If the days of Egyptian Mummies are past, how dare Mrs. Prodgit
require, for the use of my son, an amount of flannel and linen that
would carpet my humble roof? Do I wonder that she requires it?
No! This morning, within an hour, I beheld this agonising sight.
I beheld my son – Augustus George – in Mrs. Prodgit’s hands, and on
Mrs. Prodgit’s knee, being dressed. He was at the moment,
comparatively speaking, in a state of nature; having nothing on,
but an extremely short shirt, remarkably disproportionate to the
length of his usual outer garments. Trailing from Mrs. Prodgit’s
lap, on the floor, was a long narrow roller or bandage – I should
say of several yards in extent. In this, I SAW Mrs. Prodgit
tightly roll the body of my unoffending infant, turning him over
and over, now presenting his unconscious face upwards, now the back
of his bald head, until the unnatural feat was accomplished, and
the bandage secured by a pin, which I have every reason to believe
entered the body of my only child. In this tourniquet, he passes
the present phase of his existence. Can I know it, and smile!
I fear I have been betrayed into expressing myself warmly, but I
feel deeply. Not for myself; for Augustus George. I dare not
interfere. Will any one? Will any publication? Any doctor? Any
parent? Any body? I do not complain that Mrs. Prodgit (aided and
abetted by Mrs. Bigby) entirely alienates Maria Jane’s affections
from me, and interposes an impassable barrier between us. I do not
complain of being made of no account. I do not want to be of any
account. But, Augustus George is a production of Nature (I cannot
think otherwise), and I claim that he should be treated with some
remote reference to Nature. In my opinion, Mrs. Prodgit is, from
first to last, a convention and a superstition. Are all the
faculty afraid of Mrs. Prodgit? If not, why don’t they take her in
hand and improve her?
P.S. Maria Jane’s Mama boasts of her own knowledge of the subject,
and says she brought up seven children besides Maria Jane. But how
do I know that she might not have brought them up much better?
Maria Jane herself is far from strong, and is subject to headaches,
and nervous indigestion. Besides which, I learn from the
statistical tables that one child in five dies within the first
year of its life; and one child in three, within the fifth. That
don’t look as if we could never improve in these particulars, I
think!
P.P.S. Augustus George is in convulsions.
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LYING AWAKE
‘MY uncle lay with his eyes half closed, and his nightcap drawn
almost down to his nose. His fancy was already wandering, and
began to mingle up the present scene with the crater of Vesuvius,
the French Opera, the Coliseum at Rome, Dolly’s Chop-house in