. A
thousand pities that you should ever have been in the hands of these
Egyptians."

But again came nothing but the dumb-show look, as much as to say, "Pray
leave me; quacks, and indignation against quacks, both are vain."

But, once more, the other went on: "How different we herb-doctors! who
claim nothing, invent nothing; but staff in hand, in glades, and upon
hillsides, go about in nature, humbly seeking her cures. True Indian
doctors, though not learned in names, we are not unfamiliar with
essences--successors of Solomon the Wise, who knew all vegetables, from
the cedar of Lebanon, to the hyssop on the wall. Yes, Solomon was the
first of herb-doctors. Nor were the virtues of herbs unhonored by yet
older ages. Is it not writ, that on a moonlight night,

"Medea gathered the enchanted herbs
That did renew old AEson?"

Ah, would you but have confidence, you should be the new AEson, and
I your Medea. A few vials of my Omni-Balsamic Reinvigorator would, I am
certain, give you some strength."

Upon this, indignation and abhorrence seemed to work by their excess the
effect promised of the balsam. Roused from that long apathy of
impotence, the cadaverous man started, and, in a voice that was as the
sound of obstructed air gurgling through a maze of broken honey-combs,
cried: "Begone! You are all alike. The name of doctor, the dream of
helper, condemns you. For years I have been but a gallipot for you
experimentizers to rinse your experiments into, and now, in this livid
skin, partake of the nature of my contents. Begone! I hate ye."

"I were inhuman, could I take affront at a want of confidence, born of
too bitter an experience of betrayers. Yet, permit one who is not
without feeling----"

"Begone! Just in that voice talked to me, not six months ago, the German
doctor at the water cure, from which I now return, six months and sixty
pangs nigher my grave."

"The water-cure? Oh, fatal delusion of the well-meaning Preisnitz!--Sir,
trust me----"

"Begone!"

"Nay, an invalid should not always have his own way. Ah, sir, reflect
how untimely this distrust in one like you. How weak you are; and
weakness, is it not the time for confidence? Yes, when through weakness
everything bids despair, then is the time to get strength by
confidence."

Relenting in his air, the sick man cast upon him a long glance of
beseeching, as if saying, "With confidence must come hope; and how can
hope be?"

The herb-doctor took a