Wood, Richard Spike, Esq., M.R.C.S.,-to whose house White at once directed his footsteps, inquiring if the medical gentleman was at home. Fortunately, and it was a rare occurrence, so great is the demand for Mr. Spike's services, the eminent practitioner was then engaged in his laboratory preparing medicines which required his personal superintendencethe case being that of the Dowager Countess of Catspaw, who, we are happy to say, is now progressing favourably after her recent severe indisposition, and ever ready at the call of distress, whether the applicant be of high or low degree,-Mr. Spike lost no time in taking down and putting on his hat, and providing himself with a case of instruments, bandages, and other necessary appliances, and, guided by White, rushed over to the cats'-meat-man's cottage, where, stretched upon a bed in the inner room behind the front parlour, and directly facing the kitchen, he found the gallant Colonel, who was groaning audibly, having by that time regained his senses after the overwhelming fall. With that promptitude which is one of the leading characteristics of the distinguished surgeon, Mr. Spike discovered that Colonel Loftus Tippy's injury was confined to luxation of the left shoulder, no fracture of the clavicle had occurred, the humerus was not shattered, as he had at first been led to imagine might have been the case,-the osseous parts were entirely sound, and the muscular integuments free from laceration. In an incredibly short space of time the disabled limb was replaced, and so established as to give rise to sanguine expectations that in the course of a few days it might, under the same skilful care, move once more freely in its socket. The question now was the removal of the gallant Colonel to his own residence in Piccadilly. It was ascertained, on inquiry, that the runaway piebalds had been stopped by Busfield, the keeper on duty at the Macclesfield Gate, Regent's Park,-and neither they nor Colonel Tippy's groom, John Bickers, had received the slightest injury; but as it would have been too hazardous, in the condition in which Colonel Tippy then was, for him to have attempted to re-enter the phaeton, Mr. Spike, sent directions to prepare his own brougham, and attaching himself unreservedly to his unexpected patient, proceeded with him to Piccadilly, and did not quit the sufferer till he fully satisfied himself that it was no longer unsafe to leave him for the night. Colonel Tippy, who handsomely rewarded the old soldier, White, was, we are happy to add, considerably better yesterday, and hopes are entertained that, unless unfavourable symptoms should declare themselves, in the course of the next fortnight or three weeks the gallant officer may be again restored to convalescence, and to that society of which he is so distinguished an ornament."

"How beautiful, Doctar," said Loftus Tippy, wiping his eyes, as he read the paragraph to Mr. Spike-" how beautiful, and how true! What wonderful things the newspapers are. They get hold of everything the

moment it occurs.'

"They do," replied Mr. Spike, using his own handkerchief freely. "The press is a wonderful institution. It may be called the safety-valve of the nation. If the views of this inestimable journal," he added, as he laid down the paper, "should be a little too rose-coloured, we must not blame it for that. I trust it may have cause, Colonel Tippy, to hail your

reappearance in the beau monde as speedily as it supposes, but we must precipitate nothing. Festina lente, you know, is a very good rule." "I forget what that means, Doctar!" said the invalid.

"Hurry no man's cattle, but let them be jogging," returned Mr. Spike.

"You don't think, then, that it will do for me to get up to-day?" "Certainly not. A most imprudent thing. Not to be thought of. Colonel Tippy," pursued Mr. Spike, gravely; "up to the present moment I have directed my attention chiefly to the damaged shoulder, but I have not, in the mean time, been unmindful of other things. It rarely happens that such a shock as your frame has undergone passes away without awakening some dormant disease. Observe, I do not say that you have any hitherto-concealed malady, but such a state of the case is always possible, and it may be so in the present instance."

"Good Gawd, Doctar!" exclaimed Loftus Tippy, taking fright at Mr. Spike's serious manner, "what is the mattar with me? Have I anything dredfle? You said I had a good pectoral!"

"Calm yourself, calm yourself, my dear sir. I said nothing to alarm

you. Be so good as to give me your undivided attention. There are no present grounds for apprehension, and I earnestly trust I may discover none, but I should not be performing my professional duty, nor acting justly towards you, if I did not attempt to ascertain the general state of your health, and clearly satisfy myself that every organ in your body satisfactorily performs its functions. You do not object to this?"

"Oh no, Doctar! I should be very glad. I have long wanted to know all about my interiar, for I have very singular sensatians sometimes."

"Allow me, then," said Mr. Spike, "to examine your chest. We need remove nothing. It is better so.'

With the extended fingers of the left hand, hammered on by the knuckles of the right, Mr. Spike travelled over the region referred to. "Do I hurt you anywhere?" he asked.

"No, Doctar! But you put me in mind of a song I often sing—when I am in voice-The woodpeckar tapping.'"

"Very good! That cheerfulness is an excellent sign! I like to encourage cheerful thoughts. Woodpecker tapping! Very good indeed! We call it percussion! Now, then, for another kind of trial."

He took a stethoscope from his pocket as he spoke, and, having screwed the parts together, went through the process of auscultation. "Am I sound, Doctar ?" inquired Loftus Tippy, when the examination

was over.

Mr. Spike was not wholly without a conscience, but he always qualified his opinions with a certain amount of reserve; for, as he used to say to himself, where would our profession be if we always made a clear breast of it? So he answered smilingly: "Nothing organically wrong thereso far as I can discover. But appearances are often deceitful. Notwithstanding the progress of modern science and all its useful inventions, we cannot, in certain cases, arrive at distinctly definite conclusions while the patient is actually living. There are some conditions of the vital organs that can only be ascertained by autopsy."

66 Gracious, Doctar! That means dissectian!"

66

Strictly speaking, the word signifies 'personal observation;' but I am bound to admit that it comes to the same thing."

"You don't intend to dissect me to find out?"

Certainly not, my dear sir. In that case we should have to kill you -and our object is to keep you alive. My meaning is this: you must be carefully watched. Though, as I said before, I find no organic disease, there are local indications which require time for studying their absolute tendency. That tendency may be right or it may be wrong. Let us hope the former. For the present, then, we must keep quiet-as quiet as possible, and take what is prescribed. You don't object to bitter infusions?"

I often take them before dinnar."

"No, Doctar, I rather like bittars. "We will try chiretta first, and if that does not produce exactly the effect we anticipate, we will take calumba, or salicine, or some of the milder tonics: we are not yet quite fit for steel."

With oracular discourse of the description cited, and with medicines which, for variety's sake, if for no other, were changed every alternate day, and which did Loftus Tippy no more harm than make him imagine he stood in need of them, the gallant Beefeater remained the patient of Mr. Spike. Of course he became somewhat languid under the combined influence of bed and physic, but he did not lose sight of the objects that had interested him before he got into the Doctor's hands.

Foremost amongst these was Miss Arabella Hardback, whom, with the persistence which was a part of his nature-a nature that could not be brought to understand a rebuff-he continued to picture to himself as smitten by his perfections.

"If that wretched boay had not begun screaming at the critical moment, the thing would have been settled long ago. And then that offensively muddy charactar must needs make his appearance! Quite enough with his horrid odar to stifle any demonstration of the tendar passian. If I had not been afraid of dirtying my boots, I would have kicked him back again into the rivar. Luckily, it is only my left arm that was injared. I am strong enough, I think, to use my right hand. I will write and make a formal renewal of my proposal."

In what manner Loftus Tippy executed his intention, and what resulted from it, in more ways than one, we shall see hereafter.

AUSTERLITZ.

On the evening of September 30, 1805, the château of Monrepos, situated at the foot of the Hohenasperg, in Suabia, was the scene of one of those fêtes champêtres which the Elector Frederick of Würtemberg was wont to hold there. On this day he was keeping up the marriage of his second son, Paul. The lake in the park had reflected the gay colours of the fireworks, and dancing was going on in the central hall of the villa. Prince Eugene of Würtemberg-whom we met last month at the age of thirteen* under very painful circumstances, and whom we may again meet hereafter in a most honourable position-was dancing with his pretty cousin, Catharine, who, in her youthful merriment, did not dream that she would be so unhappy as to become Queen of Westphalia, and wife of a prince of Napoleonic making, who already possessed a wife most legitimately attached to him. While the young people were waltzing, a group of gentlemen was formed at the end of the hall, in the centre of which the tall, enormously stout form of the Elector was prominently displayed. A whisper was going round, though anything but a cheerful one. The brow of the ruler was overcast-very overcast. News had just arrived from the Austrian head-quarters at Ulm-news of a serious nature. For, as the figment of the German Empire still existed, the vicinity of the imperial army might, perhaps, be intended as a hint to his Electoral Highness that he had duties to perform as a Prince of the Empire. No less serious news had also arrived from other quarters. The Emperor Napoleon, immensely delighted that Austria had thrust herself forward as whipping-boy for England, and had thus freed him from his colossal embarrassment called the Camp of Boulogne, had thrown his masses with lightning speed on the Rhine and across the Rhine, in order that the storm collected on the Channel coast might be discharged over Germany, which country would again have the honour of serving as the battle-field for the contending nations of Europe.

For Mr. Pitt, the overseer of the great coalition spinning factory in the Foreign Department, had, in the mean while, completed the warp of the third old monarchical alliance designed against France. He had not found this very difficult; he had only inserted a promise of subsidies in the secret alliance formed between Austria and Russia in 1804. In the summer of 1805, then, the third coalition was ready to put a final stop to the excesses of the "French, or rather Corsican, usurper," and on April 11th England signed a treaty with Russia, which Sweden at once joined-poor Gustavus IV., it will cost you dearly-and Austria on August 9th. In truth, there was no lack of Napoleonic excesses to justify the allies, for the devourer of nations was already proving the truth of the French proverb, "L'appétit vient en mangeant. "It is true that the new Emperor had solemnly promised in his speech from the throne on December 27, 1804, that he would not increase the French territory, or incorporate any foreign land with it; but Napoleon had attained that pitch when he did exactly the opposite of what he said. Hence, in March,

VOL. LIV.

* Cfr. Russian Magna Charta.

2 M

1805, he gave the pseudo-republic of Holland a new constitution, which rendered it as easy to gulp that country as an oyster, and directly after ordered the consulta of the Italian pseudo-republic to perform a consult ing farce, the result of which was, that he added the title of King of Italy to his other titles, and on May 26th-amid the shouts of the population, of course-placed the iron crown of Lombardy on his head (Dio me la diede guai a chi la tocca). Finally, the incorporation of the left bank of the Rhine and the occupation of Hanover were a sufficient proof of the veracity of his assurance that he did not intend to augment France. The allies considered it necessary to look out for further help, and Prussia's junction naturally appeared to them most desirable. The hour was at hand, therefore, when Prussia must form a decision; but that was the weakest point in the character of Frederick William III. Shortly before it had cost him no end of trouble to decide on appointing Baron von Stein, his finance minister. Moreover, the foreign policy of Prussia was French-we would say decidedly French, if we might use that word in connexion with Prussia. The first partition of Germany, in 1803, had considerably enlarged that country, and Napoleon had sent Duroc to Berlin to hold out Hanover as a bait. Still, we must allow that the conduct of the allies towards Prussia was not of a nature to render that state desirous of the alliance. Pitt was certainly statesman enough to see that Prussia must be offered real advantages-say, the whole left bank of the Rhine and the Netherlands-as an inducement to give up her neutrality. But neither Austria nor Russia was willing to grant Prussia such aggrandisement, and Czar Alexander was of opinion that his "friend" Frederick William could be rendered supple by a judicious blending of promises and threats. If this did not succeed, Russian pride flattered itself that "Prussia could be subdued en route, and compelled to fight against France." In this sense Adam Czartoryski, minister of foreign affairs, wrote to the German envoy at Vienna, when the war was about to break out in Germany: "The Czar does not conceal from himself the disadvantages which a war with Prussia might entail; but Europe must not be allowed to say that the Emperor of Russia sent an army into the field, joined it in person, and ended by yielding to the will of the King of Prussia." While the good people in Berlin were coquetting with neutrality, the Rhenish Confederation was being actively prepared. Ere the Emperor left Paris for the Rhine, he was certain that the potentates of Bavaria, Würtemberg, Baden, Hesse, and Nassau, would become his vassals. He calculated that all these gentry would jump at dynastie advantages at the expense of their country, and he had it in black and white from Bavaria that his calculation was correct. Emperor Francis, in the mean while, had written to the Elector of Bavaria, and ordered him to send his troops to join the Austro-Russian army. “On my knees I implore your imperial majesty," the Elector wrote back, "to consent to my neutrality, for my son, the crown prince, is now in France, and, consequently, in Napoleon's power, and will be held as hostage should Bavaria not remain neutral." Honest Max Joseph forgot to add, though, that he had sent his son to France for the express purpose. He then fled from the approaching troops of his own emperor to Würzburg, where he had an army of twenty-five thousand men, and led them to join the two hundred thousand French, who had just crossed the Rhine between