Page 952 - of-human-bondage-

Philip’s eyes twinkled as he answered.
‘Have you any objection?’
Doctor South gave him a look, but did not reply directly.
‘What’s that you’re reading?’
‘Peregrine Pickle. Smollett.’
‘I happen to know that Smollett wrote Peregrine Pickle.’
‘I beg your pardon. Medical men aren’t much interested
in literature, are they?’
Philip had put the book down on the table, and Doc-
tor South took it up. It was a volume of an edition which
had belonged to the Vicar of Blackstable. It was a thin book
bound in faded morocco, with a copperplate engraving as
a frontispiece; the pages were musty with age and stained
with mould. Philip, without meaning to, started forward a
little as Doctor South took the volume in his hands, and a
slight smile came into his eyes. Very little escaped the old
doctor.
‘Do I amuse you?’ he asked icily.
‘I see you’re fond of books. You can always tell by the way
people handle them.’
Doctor South put down the novel immediately.
‘Breakfast at eight-thirty,’ he said and left the room.
‘What a funny old fellow!’ thought Philip.
He soon discovered why Doctor South’s assistants found
it difficult to get on with him. In the first place, he set his
face firmly against all the discoveries of the last thirty years:
he had no patience with the drugs which became mod-
ish, were thought to work marvellous cures, and in a few
years were discarded; he had stock mixtures which he had

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