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another physician sent for; there would
be weary unsuccessful attempts to procure one;
she would threaten to go herself, rave, bemoan
herself, despair, suspect everybody. A frightfully
morbid nature, deprived of its habitual stimulant
of laudanum � which she has taken yearly in
considerable quantities � her whole being is a tor-
ment to herself and others. Her jealousy is such
that she would fain keep her husband locked up in the
house; she suspects him of incontinence even when
he goes out to buy a newspaper. Old Blake-
man was unwise enough to be impressed by her
talk of poison, though she acknowledges the folly
of that now. He is dismissed and an homeo-
pathic doctor engaged � at which I don�t think
Blakeman will have reason to repine in the long
run. This new physician receives the praise ac-
corded to all new fancies, by both husband and
wife. Add duns, debt, difficulty
and all the bedevilments inevitably attendant on
an ill-managed improvident household to
domestic misery and Bellew�s nervous hell may
be imagined. His father in law, with whom
he has always been the best of friends, �sprang
a mine on him,� as F. B. phrases it,
t�other day. Bellew had remarked that he
would do so and so, get this or that for his