'No,' says the eldest sister, 'I dare answer for my brother; he knows
the world better.' Thus the discourse ended, but it left the elder brother quite
confounded. He concluded his brother had made a full discovery, and he
began to doubt whether I had been concerned in it or not; but with all
his management he could not bring it about to get at me. At last he
was so perplexed that he was quite desperate, and resolved he would
come into my chamber and see me, whatever came of it. In order to do
this, he contrived it so, that one day after dinner, watching his
eldest sister till he could see her go upstairs, he runs after her.
'Hark ye, sister,' says he, 'where is this sick woman? May not a body
see her?' 'Yes,' says the sister, 'I believe you may; but let me go
first a little, and I'll tell you.' So she ran up to the door and gave
me notice, and presently called to him again. 'Brother,' says she,
'you may come if you please.' So in he came, just in the same kind of
rant. 'Well,' says he at the door as he came in, 'where is this sick
body that's in love? How do ye do, Mrs. Betty?' I would have got up
out of my chair, but was so weak I could not for a good while; and he
saw it, and his sister to, and she said, 'Come, do not strive to stand
up; my brother desires no ceremony, especially now you are so weak.'
'No, no, Mrs. Betty, pray sit still,' says he, and so sits himself down
in a chair over against me, and appeared as if he was mighty merry.
He talked a lot of rambling stuff to his sister and to me, sometimes of
one thing, sometimes of another, on purpose to amuse his sister, and
every now and then would turn it upon the old story, directing it to
me. 'Poor Mrs. Betty,' says he, 'it is a sad thing to be in love; why,
it has reduced you sadly.' At last I spoke a little. 'I am glad to
see you so merry, sir,' says I; 'but I think the doctor might have
found something better to do than to make his game at his patients. If
I had been ill of no other distemper, I know the proverb too well to
have let him come to me.' 'What proverb?' says he, 'Oh! I remember it
now. What-"Where love is the case,
The doctor's an ass."