laxation
for his patients.

'In time the children went mad with excitement, and jumped for very joy
on learning that they had contracted measles, and would far sooner, any
day, have the mumps than a birthday every week. And oh! what thrills of
joy would pass through their little frames on learning that they would
have to lie up for a bilious attack and be attended by the good-natured
Doctor Ebenezer Scrout, and treated with his delicious jalaps and
powders.

'Unfortunately, however, so pleasant was the treatment, that the
children in time were even tempted to make themselves ill on purpose, by
eating as many jam puffs as they could buy with their Saturday monies,
and soon nearly every child was down with a bad bilious attack, and all
the schools had to be closed.

'Even the grown-ups began to indulge in these jam puffs, buying them in
large quantities and falling ill one by one, much preferring to be
tucked up snugly in bed with a comfortable bilious attack and the
good-natured doctor in attendance, to ordinary good health and hard
work, with the many disappointments and trials of everyday life.

'First the Lord Mayor was taken bad--then the leader of the town band
and all his bandsmen. Now the shopmen began to feel queer, and one by
one the aldermen toddled to their beds. In time everybody was laid up,
and no one was left to do the work of the town. All the shops, theatres,
markets, and railway stations were closed, and the streets quite
deserted except for the doctor and the puff baker, each trying to undo
the work of the other.

'Hardly a sound could be heard in the streets except perhaps the clink
of a spoon against a bottle from a room above, as some patient prepared
his evening dose, or the shuffling footsteps of the old doctor as he
went his daily round, and sometimes the loud rat-tat of the puff baker
would awaken the echoes of the lonely streets as he called from door to
door for orders in the morning.

'Strange grasses and sweet-scented wild flowers began to grow in the
streets, and mushrooms and straggling carrots forced a way between the
crevices of the pavements. Sprays of wild spinach hung from the
lamp-posts, and the market-place became one waving jungle of broccoli.
The very sparrows, deprived of their daily crumbs, grew thin and nervy
with the green diet they were compelled to subsist upon. Croaking and
griding, instead of chirruping musically to their young as is their
wont, they so affected th