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Lord Bacon, who was a very great physician in both senses of the word, hath this aphorism in his "Essay upon Health," 'Nihil magis ad Sanitatem tribuit quam crebrae et domesticae purgationes'. By 'domesticae', he means those simple uncompounded purgatives which everybody can administer to themselves; such as senna-tea, stewed prunes and senria, chewing a little rhubarb, or dissolving an ounce and a half of manna in fair water, with the juice of a lemon to make it palatable.
For this purpose she gave herself the worst cold she could achieve, and cherished diligently what she proudly considered to be a racking cough. But Miss Frederick was deaf to the latter, and only threatened the usual upstairs seclusion and senna-tea for the former, whereupon Marcella in alarm declared that her cold was much better and gave up the cough in despair.
For though she had her movements of fierce revolt, when she was within an ace of throwing the senna-tea in Martha's face, and rushing downstairs in her nightgown to denounce Miss Frederick in the midst of an astonished schoolroom, something generally interposed; not conscience, it is to be feared, or any wish "to be good," but only an aching, inmost sense of childish loneliness and helplessness; a perception that she had indeed tried everybody's patience to the limit, and that these days in bed represented crises which must be borne with even by such a rebel as Marcie Boyce.
After the debate I walked about the streets with Bulwer till near three o'clock. I spoke to him about his novels with perfect sincerity, praising warmly, and criticising freely. He took the praise as a greedy boy takes apple-pie, and the criticism as a good dutiful boy takes senna-tea.
The tea-bell would ring perhaps in the depths far below, and the sound would complete the transformation of the Princess's maid-of-honour into Marcie Boyce, the plain naughty child, whom nobody cared about, whose mother never wrote to her, who in contrast to every other girl in the school had not a single "party frock," and who would have to choose next morning between another dumb day of senna-tea and gruel, supposing she chose to plead that her cold was still obstinate, or getting up at half-past six to repeat half a page of Ince's "Outlines of English History" in the chilly schoolroom, at seven.
Lord Bacon, who was a very great physician in both senses of the word, hath this aphorism in his "Essay upon Health," 'Nihil magis ad Sanitatem tribuit quam crebrae et domesticae purgationes'. By 'domesticae', he means those simple uncompounded purgatives which everybody can administer to themselves; such as senna-tea, stewed prunes and senria, chewing a little rhubarb, or dissolving an ounce and a half of manna in fair water, with the juice of a lemon to make it palatable.
Now the rule of the house when any girl was ordered to bed with a cold was, in the first place, that she should not put her arms outside the bedclothes for if you were allowed to read and amuse yourself in bed you might as well be up; that the housemaid should visit the patient in the early morning with a cup of senna-tea, and at long and regular intervals throughout the day with beef-tea and gruel; and that no one should come to see and talk with her, unless, indeed, it were the doctor, quiet being in all cases of sickness the first condition of recovery, and the natural schoolgirl in Miss Frederick's persuasion being more or less inclined to complain without cause if illness were made agreeable.
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