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were here last. I’m glad to be thinner, I didn’t like being so
fat. Dr. Wigram thinks I’m all the better for being thinner
than I was.’
When dinner was over the housekeeper brought him
some medicine.
‘Show the prescription to Master Philip,’ he said. ‘He’s a
doctor too. I’d like him to see that he thinks it’s all right. I
told Dr. Wigram that now you’re studying to be a doctor he
ought to make a reduction in his charges. It’s dreadful the
bills I’ve had to pay. He came every day for two months, and
he charges five shillings a visit. It’s a lot of money, isn’t it?
He comes twice a week still. I’m going to tell him he needn’t
come any more. I’ll send for him if I want him.’
He looked at Philip eagerly while he read the prescrip-
tions. They were narcotics. There were two of them, and one
was a medicine which the Vicar explained he was to use
only if his neuritis grew unendurable.
‘I’m very careful,’ he said. ‘I don’t want to get into the
opium habit.’
He did not mention his nephew’s affairs. Philip fancied
that it was by way of precaution, in case he asked for money,
that his uncle kept dwelling on the financial calls upon him.
He had spent so much on the doctor and so much more
on the chemist, while he was ill they had had to have a fire
every day in his bed-room, and now on Sunday he needed
a carriage to go to church in the evening as well as in the
morning. Philip felt angrily inclined to say he need not be
afraid, he was not going to borrow from him, but he held
his tongue. It seemed to him that everything had left the old

Of Human Bondage