When Queen Mary was seized with the smallpox, which the court physicians were not able to raise, Radcliffe was sent for by the council; and upon his perusing the recipes, he told them plainly that her majesty was a dead woman; and he said, after her death, that this great and good princess died a sacrifice by unskilful hands, who out of one disease, had produced a complication, by improper remedies.

Some few months after this, the doctor, who till then had been a favourite with Princess Anne of Denmark, to whom he was physician in ordinary, lost her good opinion by his uncourtly behaviour and inordinate attachment to the bottle. Her Royal Highness being indisposed, gave orders that Radcliffe should be sent for, in answer to which he said he would come soon; but not

like a physician for once, and, with an air of gravity, am very apprehensive, that I may anger the one, in being too complaisant to the other. You cannot call this pinning my faith on any man's sleeve: those who know me, are too well apprized of a quite contrary tendency. As I never flattered a man myself, so it is my firm resolution, never to be wheedled out of my real sentiments, which are, that since it has been my good fortune to be educated, according to the usage of the church of England, established by law; I shall never make myself so unhappy as to shame my teachers and instructors, by departing from what I have imbibed from them.

"Yet, though I shall never be brought over to confide in your doctrines, no one breathing, can have a greater esteem for your conversation, by letter or word of mouth, than,

"Sir, &c."

appearing

appearing, another messenger was sent, saying, that she was very ill; at which the doctor swore by his Maker, that " her distemper was nothing but the vapours, and that she was in as good a state of health as any woman breathing, if she could but believe it." On his appearance at court not long after, he found, to his great mortification, that this freedom had been highly resented; for, on his offering to go into the presence, he was stopped by an officer in the anti-chamber, who told him, "that the princess had no farther occasion for the services of a physician who would not obey her orders, and that she had made choice of Dr. Gibbons to succeed him in the care of her health."

Radcliffe, on his return to his companions, affected great unconcern at what had happened, and even went so far as to treat the princess with additional ridicule, as well as her physician, saying, that "Nurse Gibbons had got a new nursery, which he by no means envied him the possession of, since his capacity was only equal to the ailments of a patient, which had no other existence than in the imagination."

Another rival of Radcliffe's was Sir Edward Hannes, who on his arrival in London, set up a very elegant chariot; but finding his endeavours to fail short, he had recourse to a stratagem, and ordered his footmen to stop most of the gentlemen's carriages, and enquire if they belonged to Dr. Hannes, as if he was wanted to a

patient. Accordingly the fellow used to run from Whitehall to the Exchange, and, entering Garraway's, enquire if Dr. Hannes was there. At last Radcliffe, who was usually at this coffeehouse about exchange time, cried out, " Dr. Hannes is not here," and desired to know who wanted him? The fellow answered, "such and such a lord:" but Radcliffe replied, "No, no, friend, you are mistaken, it is the doctor who wants those lords." However, Hannes got great business, and became a principal physician at court; on which occasion an old acquaintance of Radcliffe's, in order to see how he would digest the promotion of so young a practitioner, brought him the news of it. "So much the better for him," says the doctor, "for now he has got a patent for killing." Upon this, the other, endeavouring to try, if possible, to ruffle his temper, said, "but what is more surprising, this same doctor has two pair of the finest horses that ever were seen;" to which Radcliffe coolly replied, "then they will sell for the more."

Such, however, was his fame, that he was sure to be applied to in all desperate cases; and the king in particular, when he found himself very much indisposed, had recourse to Radcliffe's advice. The doctor being admitted, found his Majesty reading L'Estrange's new version of Æsop's Fables. William shutting the book, told him, that he had sent for him once more to try the effects of his great skill, although he had been told

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