beyond that of most of his neighbours, for they had not a
single spiritual interest. He was spiritual in his treatment of disease.
He was before his age by half a century, and instead of "throwing in"
drugs after the fashion of Butcher, he prescribed fresh air, rest, and
change, and, above everything, administered his own powerful
individuality. He did not follow his friend Elliotson into mesmerism,
but he had a mesmerism of his own, subduing all terror and sanative like
light. Mr. Gosford was not capable of great expression, but he was
always as expressive as he could be when he told the story of that
dreadful illness.

"He come into the room and ordered all the physic away, and then he sat
down beside me, and it was just afore hay-harvest, and I was in mortal
fright, and I said to him, 'Oh, doctor, I shall die.' Never shall I
forget what I had gone through that night, for I'd done nothing but see
the grave afore me, and I was lying in it a-rotting. Well, he took my
hand, and he said, 'Why, for that matter, my friend, I must die too; but
there's nothing in it; you won't complain when you find out what death
is. You won't die yet, though, and you'll get this lot of hay in at any
rate; what a heavy crop it is!' and he opened the winder and looked out.
The way he spoke was wonderful, and what it was which come into me when
he said, '_I must die too_,' I don't know, but all my terrors went away,
and I lay as calm as a child. 'Fore God I did, as calm as a child, and I
felt the wind upon me across the meadow while he stood looking at it, and
I could almost have got up that minute. I warn't out of bed for a
fortnight, but I did go out into the hayfield, as he said."

Why did Dr. Turnbull come to Eastthorpe? Nobody ever knew while he
lived. The question had been put at least some thousands of times, and
all kinds of inquiries made, but with no result. The real reason,
discovered afterwards, was simply that he had bad health, and that he had
fled from temptation in the shape of a woman whom he loved, but whom
duty, as he interpreted it, forbade him to marry, because he considered
it wicked to run the risk of bringing diseased children into the world.

This was the man to whom Catharine went. Mrs. Furze went with her. He
was perfectly acquainted with Mrs. Furze, and had seen Catharine, but had
never spoken to her. Mrs. Furze told her story, which was that Catharine
had no appetite, and was wasting from no assignab