Burton ('Dr. Slop') : his forceps and his foes / by Alban Doran.

  • Doran, Alban H. G. (Alban Henry Griffiths), 1849-1927
Date:
1913
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Burton ('Dr. Slop') : his forceps and his foes / by Alban Doran. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    39/56 (page 29)
    inclined to side with the Whig view of the charge against him, hut perhaps Ferriar was a Whig, or an enemy of the papists. Burton maintains that he knew who betrayed him. “ On my being seen (although a Prisoner) Avith the Highlanders, a Quaker, one B-rb-k of Settle,” sent the news express to York, to the dismay of Burton’s friends and the joy of his enemies. Mrs. Burton knew that he carried pistols 1 and had often declared that he would shoot the first man who would attack him. She iioav believed that the Guards would possibly arrest him at Mickelgate Bar, and after duly taking advice she sent a person to meet him and desire that in the case of such an attempt he would not offer to make any resistance. Just as the net was closing around him, poor Burton had professional dealings Avith the Avarning messenger : “ She [Mrs. Burton] sent one Robinson, Avho met me at the South End of Dring-houses, and told me what my Wife requested of me; I made him no other Return, than to enquire how his Wife did, who (at that Time was my Patient) he told me, that he should be glad if I would go that Night to see her. I begg’d to he excus’d as it was so late, and as I was so tir’d unless her Situation requir’d it, and that I desir’d he would come and send to my House, and I would prescribe for her, since he had told me how her Disorder had alter’d after I had seen her; he then reply’d that as it would be so much out of his way, he Avould be oblig’d to me, to call at any public House and give him Directions; I call’d, prescrib’d, and then went on to my own House. The Prescription, he that Night gave to his Servant to carry to the Apothecary, who kept it upon the Files as usual. The Patient after this Prescription recover’d. This A\fas afterwards mention’d as an aggravating Circumstance, or rather as they would have it a Proof that I must have been on treasonable Business, for right or wrong it must be a Plot, because there was a Papist con- cern’d, or because they knew not what to make of it.” Longa est Injuria, longae Ambages, as Burton says in this pamphlet. Latin quotations were eA^er soothing to the Eighteenth- century soul in affliction, but the full record of what ensued would be very wearying to the reader. The Doctor Avas not arrested at the Gate, Mrs. Burton told him of the Quaker’s treacherous information, i. “Thou hast come forth unarmed; thou hast left thy tire-tete, thy newly-invented forceps . . . behind thee : by Heaven! at this moment they are hanging up in a green baize bag between thy two pistols at the bed’s head.” Tristram Shandy, Bk. II, Chap. XI. (1812). There is some mystery about Burton’s orvn itinerary. He went to Hornby (British Liberty, p. 27) Avhich is in Lancashire, betA\-een Settle and Lancaster, not to be confounded with the Hornby near Richmond, thirty miles north-east of Settle. Yet further on (p. 40) he speaks of “ My Return to York from Lancaster.” Perhaps he meant Lancashire.