Things with the Buccaneer had so gone from bad to worse and so preyed upon his mind that his body became affected and he was seized with illness of a lingering kind; but the nature of his illness no one knew.

Now his island was celebrated for men skilled in the treatment of every known disease that man is heir to. Many of these men were specialists, that is to say, they bestowed the whole of their labour and attention upon some one particular disease, or part of the human body. Others again were faddists, that is, they pinned their faith to some particular course of treatment. One of these tried upon the Buccaneer total abstinence, but he got so weak and irritable that this man was shown the door. He went away perfectly well satisfied that the Buccaneer's life was merely a matter of days. Another doctor was called in, who declared he was no advocate for slops and physic. A generous, but plain diet, with plenty of fish to strengthen the brain, the whole washed down by a tablespoonful of whisky diluted well with water, twice a day, was all that was required; but on no account to touch claret, which, he declared, was little better than poison, while sherry was molten lead to the strongest stomach. This advice was not given in the above simple terms, for no little of the physician's skill depends upon a grave deportment, and the use of a language altogether unintelligible to the ordinary mind. Then when by long familiarity the understanding does begin to grasp a name, a new denomination is found for an old complaint, or something fresh is manufactured out of the weakness of the human body. The above treatment was acceptable for a time; but it soon began to pall upon one who had all his life been accustomed to good living, so another doctor had to be tried. When this eminent man heard of the course prescribed by his predecessor, he raised his eyebrows and smiled in a grave and wise manner; there being no approach, however, to coarse and vulgar mirth. "Ah!" he said, as he read over the prescription and order of diet, "brother Grain is a very clever fellow, without doubt, but he has his whims and fancies. Whisky he swears by, because he likes it himself; but I confidently assert that you cannot drink anything very much worse. A little good sound claret, not any of those mixtures, mind you, that are made at home, but a good, pure, wholesome, sound, and not manufactured wine. This, and a diet of game, or fowl, will bring you relief. The nature of your disease is to be explained simply thus: Imperfect mastication and a slight weakness of the salivary glands not bringing about a healthy deglutition there is in consequence a corresponding loss of chymification, followed by imperfect chylification, and thus the food is not properly acted upon before it passes through the pyloric opening into the duodenum. Having had the above explained to you in this simple and unpedantic manner, you will, no doubt, my dear sir, feel very much more at ease." Having thus delivered himself, the doctor took both his fee and his departure.

How sad it is that the poor human body cannot run through its brief span of life, without having to carry about inside it a bottled-up disease of some kind or other, which in time eats through the cork, or stopper, and flows out all over the system, poisoning everything. Taking away all sunshine, all happiness, until at length it dries up the channels of life; not sparing either the great and rich, but attacking the mighty as well as the lowly; not leaving alone so great a man even as our bold Buccaneer. It is sad, but then there is a crowd waiting for us to move on.

After the faddists came the specialists. Each one of these saw in the Buccaneer's illness some one of the symptoms of his own especial disease. Many of these most eminent men met in consultation, and there was a great diversity of opinion. Each of the learned physicians flew at once to his particular part of the Buccaneer's body. One said he was suffering from dropsy and that nothing would save him but immediate tapping. Another said it was stone, while a third was equally sure it was his kidneys that were affected; this happening to be at the time the fashionable disease. The exploring needle was thrust into every part of the patient's body, with the result that some skulking disease was said to be at the end of it, like a base conspirator plotting at the great man's life. They one and all agreed, however, that the patient was suffering from plethora, brought about by a too generous diet, which so often accompanied very great prosperity. So before they left they bled him freely; but still he neither recovered nor did he mend.

Only one set of specialists dare not approach him, and these were the mad doctors; those who treated the human mind. So sensitive was the Buccaneer on this point that it was extremely dangerous to mention the subject of insanity. He allowed all his idiots and maniacs to go about at large, and he never interfered with them until they killed some one, or outraged society by some scandalous act of indecency. They were then locked up to keep them from doing further injury.

The old coxswain stood by his master and prevented him from being either starved, bled, or physiced to death. His neighbours too, all took a kind interest in his welfare. Looked in just to see how he was getting on, and to see how long he was likely to last. Said they hoped he would soon recover; but in their hearts they hoped he never would. On their faces, as is the custom, they wore a deep look of concern; sympathised with all his sufferings, and told him to cheer up, for that they felt confident he would pull through. Inwardly they were considering what of the Buccaneer's property they would lay their hands upon, when the old gentleman became too weak to defend himself. This is not hypocrisy, it springs from that most laudable motive of not wishing to prolong the suffering, or hurt the feelings, even of a rival.

But what caused the poor old gentleman more annoyance than anything was the way some of the members of his family behaved, taking advantage of the old gentleman's state of health to pester him almost to death, and would not take no, for an answer. His daughters even gave him no peace, and their shrill voices were to be heard even above the men's, clamouring for all kind of things.

Some of them put on their nursing caps and bib-aprons and fell to wrangling amongst themselves as to how the sick man was to be treated, while at one end of the room, one Zedekiah Cant, had enthroned himself, and held forth, by way of comforting the sick man's soul, upon the horrors of hell. This reverend gentleman had slipped into the room while two priests belonging to the old Church Hulk fell foul of each other on the door-step over a matter of orthodoxy.

The old coxswain tried his best to keep them all quiet, and he read many of them a lecture; but just as he had succeeded in establishing a little peace in rushed one of the daughters—the one who, at the march-past of the disaffected, had begged that all violent death might be banished from the Buccaneer's kingdom. "Look here, sir," she exclaimed, holding up a pigeon. "It's dead!"

"Who is dead?" cried the old Buccaneer, as he raised himself up in bed, and looked fiercely round like some old terrier who on a sudden smells a rat. "Has anything happened to the Eastern Bandit?" he asked. The ruling passion it is well known is strong even in death.

"Far, far worse, sir," cried his daughter. "In wanton sport your cruel-minded sons have killed this poor, unoffending bird. Its life has been sacrificed to provide a holiday for the idle."

The Buccaneer finding that it was not his old rival who had come to grief, sank down again and appeared quite unconcerned. Miss Progress now requested silence and she at once commenced to lecture the Buccaneer upon the theory of atoms; but even this did not seem to revive the drooping spirits of the sick man. It, however, edified the lecturer to no small degree, therefore it was not altogether barren of results. No sooner had this daughter finished than another came forward, until at length the Buccaneer, who was not ill enough to stand all this worrying, requested his coxswain to pack the whole lot about their business. This he did with extreme pleasure, and he assisted Zedekiah down-stairs with the toe of his boot. As he was kicked out of the front door he was attacked and well rated by the two clerical disputants, who dropped their discussion to do battle with him.

The old coxswain took this to be a good sign, "Ah!" he said to himself, "if my old master would only rip out an oath or two, like he used to in our good old fighting days, it would gladden my heart and I would say there's life in the old dog yet."

Now there lived in the Buccaneer's island a celebrated quack, Doctor Politics by name, and there was scarcely anything that this man was not supposed to be capable of doing. He had practised long and with success and he was said to be extremely clever; having a remedy for everything as most quacks have, and as he suited his fees to every pocket he did a very good business, and was becoming more powerful in the Buccaneer's island every day he lived. No doubt this man had worked some very great cures and had brought relief to many suffering bodies; but the great quack, like all great men, had his failings. Having been successful in some things he thought himself skilled in all, and his bearing soon became presumptuous and offensive in the extreme. People, however, believed in him, and that was all that was necessary. Of course he made mistakes at times, and his patients occasionally slipped through his hands, and occasionally the cure was worse than the disease; but accidents will happen even to the cleverest men, and when he made a mistake very little was heard of it.

In an evil hour the Buccaneer put himself entirely in the hands of this physician, who when he entered the sick man's room, began to make great alterations both in medicine and diet. He was a most expensive man and his fees were exorbitant, but to one as wealthy as the Buccaneer, money is no object, and indeed he thought all the better for those things which he paid well for.

"Sir," said the quack, "I have only been called in just in time. You are suffering from a very severe depression, brought about by too good living." In this he seemed to agree with the other physicians. "Your constitution is impaired, and even endangered, and your interior economy is altogether wrong. I will prescribe for you a strict regimen. Every action must be regulated by law, I will lay down for you what you are to eat, and what you are to drink, how much, and at what times. Your hours of labour shall be defined, and also your hours for recreation; the latter I will in time make to equal, or exceed, the hours of toil. Your hours of sleep shall also be regulated, and indeed every action of your life shall be brought under proper control, so that you need never trouble yourself about anything, and any independent thought on your part, or even action, will be quite unnecessary and altogether out of place."

As is well known old servants frequently presume upon their position, and old Jack was no exception to the rule, so he said, "We have enough of your sort of medicine, doctor, on hand already and to spare. What my master wants is a little more freedom."

The doctor looked up from the work he was at and said, "Indeed, may I ask, my good sir, at what college you took your degree? Are you one of those narrow-minded bigots, who not being able to see beyond your own nose, which by the way seems to me to be an unusually long one, declare that all beyond is ignorance and folly? Pray, may I ask if you are hom[oe]opath, or allopath?"

The old coxswain took no notice but creeping up to his master he whispered in his ear, "Master, master, have a care. This fellow is weaving a straight waistcoat for you, and God only knows, you are cramped enough as it is."

But the Buccaneer did not understand his old friend and so the quack continued his work, and presently said, addressing the coxswain, "Well, my man, I will have nothing to do with you, and as you are likely to interfere with my treatment with your cut and dried notions, your room will be better than your company. Your master requires no fruit of the medlar kind."

"If your medicine," replied Jack, "is of the same kind as your joke, it won't kill with laughter if it does not cure, and there's comfort in that."

"Begone, thou dotard!" cried the quack, "and mumble your old wives' sayings to old wives' ears." Thus was poor old Jack banished from his master's room. One of the accusations brought against the Buccaneer was that he turned his back upon his friends. About the truth of this it is not necessary to trouble; in such things, and indeed in many others that ill nature floats, there is generally sufficient to give a colouring. One thing is certain, he now allowed a well-tried, and honest old servant, to be put on the wrong side of the door.

Like some faithful old dog, Jack hung about the place and often, and often tried to steal into his master's room, just to see how he was getting on. He swore he would be silent and not utter a word, but poor old Jack's reputation for silence was not great, and the quack doctor kept such an eye upon his patient that he could scarcely dare move, or speak, without his authority. The only consolation that old Jack had was to cry out in the hearing of everybody, "Well, damme! if this is liberty, give me the four iron-windowed stone walls of a prison for choice." But nobody seemed to heed him.

It was a sad sight to see this, at one time, daring old Buccaneer, so fettered and bound. Many a good fight had he fought for the sake of his freedom and after all it had only brought him to this. Evils, it is well known, never come alone, and misfortune after misfortune befell him, for one morning the merry round-faced sun rose with a broader smile than usual upon his jolly red face. It was found that Madam Liberty, of whom people had talked and prated so much, and made such a to-do about, toadying, and flattering her, on even the smallest occasion, had turned out to be no better than she should have been. The precise name by which she was known it is not necessary to mention. Women of her class have at all times played conspicuous parts in the world's history; being even favoured of princes and other noble personages, while one even was made the consort of an emperor and sat upon an Eastern throne. But a greater surprise was still in store for people, for one morning they rose up to find that the modern Phryne had disappeared in a most mysterious manner and many believed that she had been made away with by her son, Demos. This individual had now grown to great consideration in the Buccaneer's island, and under the patronage of the quack he had been made custodian of the household, and keeper of the old Buccaneer's honour; but the latter office under his care soon became a mere sinecure. In turn Demos became the master even of the quack, who had done so much to place him where he was; but is not the story of kicking away the ladder by which you have climbed, a very old one?

The uncrowned queen, Respectability, still held her sway, but her kingdom had become more confined, and she became a most prim, and exclusive sovereign. The great quack doctor treated her with the utmost consideration and politeness, and even Demos, who was for pulling down everything, tried to gain her over, but her majesty became extremely haughty and reserved, and would have little or nothing to do with him.

But now the sorrow of sorrows has to be told. It was a wild and stormy night. The rain swept over the island in blinding sheets. The wind howled amongst the rigging of the old Ship of State, and the wild waves dashed against the rock-bound coast, throwing up clouds of spray, and roaring like hungry monsters, eager to devour their prey. The old sign-board over the door of the Constitution public-house laboured to and fro in the blast, and groaned every now and again as if in pain. The light from a feeble lamp shed its uncertain rays upon two forms lying side by side on the cold, damp earth, and the wind as it passed them seemed to sing a funeral dirge to the Buccaneer's two best friends, the Beggar Woman, Patriotism, and the old coxswain, Jack Commonsense.

The two of them had travelled side by side on the road to Misfortune; begging about from door to door, but they claimed neither pity nor sympathy, all people being much too busy with their own affairs to pay them any attention. At length they dragged their starved bodies to die in front of the old house they both loved so well. With the loss of these two the Buccaneer's days, it was believed, were numbered.