Page:New winter evening's companion, of fun, mirth, and frolic.pdf/14

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Swallow; after much kecking, and to take a hearty draught of leek pottage after it, to help digestion. No sooner had the feeble patient forced down both his doses, but he turned his face to the wall, and instead of going to sleep in less than a quarter of an hour he made his exit The doctor coming next day to enquire after the success of his new medicine, looking up for the old signal, found the windows wide open, by which he understood without farther enquiry, what condition his patient was in, so altering his course, plucks out his pocket-book, and in it makes this memorandum, Toasted cheese and leek pottage, a certain cure for a Welchman, in a fever; but present death for an Englishman.

                                    ---------
                          ANECDOTE OF Sir MATTHEW HALE,
            Lord-chief Justice of the King's Bench in the Reign of
                                   Charles II.


 A Gentleman of about 5001. a year estate, in the eastern part of England, had two sons. The eldest being of a rambling disposition, took a place in a ship and went abroad. After several years his father died, when the younger son destroyed his will, and seized upon the estate. He gave  out that his eldest brother was dead, and bribed

some false witness to attest the truth of it. In the course of time the eldest brother returned, but came home in miserable circumstances. His younger brother repulsed him with scorn, told him that he was an impostor and a cheat; and asserted that his real brother was dead long ago, and he could bring witnesses to prove it. The